Tag: UTEP

UTEP Launches Senter’s Ship and He Sends Signals As He Assumes the Helm

UTEP’s new Athletic Director eliminated some of the questions many may have had about the next head coach of football. There won’t be a big name trying to catch a little lightning in a bottle one last time.  The school isn’t going to spend a bunch of money on a big name.  They are looking for a good man on the way up.  He needs to run a high scoring offense.  And the search is well underway.  I will say today so that I can be the first, that if the head coach at James Madison gets the job it will be all of the proof that any one even leaning toward conspiracies point out that the entire process is a sham.  Funny how he may just fit to a “T” what we are looking for.  So, all of you out there wanting to get an inkling about who could be on the short list, the process of elimination just made your work much easier.

Dr. Natalicio chimed in on doing more with less than anyone else, so the salary will be right about where it is.  More importantly, Dr. Natalicio just told you all you need to ever know about her feelings toward UTEP Athletics.  Small budget, and figure it out.  Be creative.  UTEP Athletics are a part of the educational mission of the school.  Any success UTEP Football finds will be purely up to the athletic department.  I have known Principals at schools just like her.  Athletics, afterschool athletics were just there.  It had to be done.  Kind of a waste of money truth be told, was their attitude.  That has been her attitude and it will never change.  She has been an incredible president of an educational institution.  But, any success the teams have is a bonus as far as she is concerned, and of little consequence if they fail.

By the way, while UTEP looks for coaches, coaches look at UTEP, too.  So as you do your own looking, keep in mind that the coach hired knows that the leader of the school doesn’t really give a rat’s ass about his passion.

As for basketball, this is supposed to be a tryout.  What that means is that there is a lot of shit hitting the fan, so on that basketball thing, I will get to that later.  Is there a signing period and recruiting to be done from now until March?  Of course.  So, as of this minute, Jim’s busy.  Keep doing your jobs.  But, just between you and me, if Jim Senter is an up and coming guy, he is going to want to pick his own guy, and the basketball coaches know that too.  It is what they do for a living.  They know the way things work.  Bottom line, basketball this season is whatever it happens to be.  The AD has given up on it.  We will work on that shit when we get a chance.

Will anything change?  Sure, the names.  If you are a fan of UTEP athletics the only name change that matters is Natalicio.   Until that, athletics at UTEP are the red-headed step-child.  Of course you eat at the same table as the rest of the family.  But, Nat’s trying to get Tier ! status not Cartel Membership.  How many of you out there really think Dr. Natalicio gives a shit about which conference we are in except if she could save money on transportation she would have more to spend NOT on athletics.  Such a waste of money.  I think she is a great president and I love UTEP for the education it gave me and the opportunities it provided.  But, I have been around long enough to know that this is how it is at UTEP.  Us sports fans really are pretty meaningless as for as UTEP is concerned.  It hurts, but that is the truth.  We got our degrees from a school that just doesn’t care about athletics.  It could be worse.  Not for a college football fan.  Nope, we are the worst.  By the way, I don’t have any hope that things would change even if she retired.  We’ve got what we get.  We don’t compete in sports at UTEP.  We hope.  We wring our hands.  We bitch about things that other people don’t have to bitch about.  We have expectations and celebrate what others can’t imagine(this season we are celebrating home grown good students at UTEP).  We have gotten used to being UTEP.

Will A New Athletic Director Change Anything At UTEP? Part 2

I left off with the student athletes and for this particular Athletic Director I believe that this has to be a priority and is a key to making the kind of changes needed to halt a downward spiral of the UTEP Athletics program since the break up of the old WAC and formation of the Mountain West Conference.  Mike Price and Bob Stull showed that years of losing do not shackle a program to continued losing.  The “losing tradition” could be broken in a matter of one or two seasons.  They may have done it differently, but they showed it can be done.  Maintaining it is another matter.  First and foremost it begins with the right head coach, but it has to be more than the personality of a coach that builds consistent winning programs.  Here is where I want to see improvement.  Again, this is a key as I see it to fixing what is not working.

Finally, the public and the fans.  In Part 1 I added it as an afterthought.  It seems too fitting to have changed it, as both the fans and the public are pretty much treated as an afterthought by UTEP.  And the good people of El Paso feel the same way about UTEP.  Neither one treats the other with the respect it deserves, and what is much worse is that if the two joined forces the power harnessed would be enormous.  The city of El Paso searches for a way to go from the five sleepy neighborhoods into a vibrant city and some kind of identity other than a gas and motel stop for travelers.  Wild West, historical border town or modern-day city.  The University of Texas at El Paso should have been THE jewel of El Paso.  The “city” of El Paso should have been and should be to this day making UTEP a focal point for outsiders instead of the place where our kids go to take classes.  I hate the term “commuter school”.  How in the Hell did the school or the people of El Paso stand for that kind of lack of respect for their own kid’s school?  How in the Hell has UTEP allowed itself to be reduced to that?  Part of it lies in the whole idea of El Paso being “separate” from the rest of Texas and cultural identities.  If there is ever to be a permanent change in UTEP Athletics this all has to change!  You can’t get a ticket to a Chihuahuas minor league baseball game.  When Mike Price was winning, the Sun Bowl was not just filled with fans.  It was an enormous generator of money.  The city of El Paso should have donated the salaries of the Convention and Visitors Bureau, passed a Hotel and Motel tax to pay the money to get a big time coach.  I’m just kidding about that, but what I’m not kidding about is El Paso, the city and the citizens understanding that a highly successful UTEP Athletic Program is nothing but a giant money machine for the city.  But, the city leaders, many of the graduates of UTEP treated UTEP like the place they took classes to get a degree instead of what it is, should be, and could be.  It is very sad to see my school treated this way, and what makes it so much worse is that it is done by the very people who you would hope would do so much better.  Including the general public.

The AD will need to find a way for the student athletes to have more of a real college campus life than a “commuter school” provides, and somehow, someway, he will have to get the people and city of El Paso to gather the strength and pride of unity needed because neither by themselves is strong enough to continue on the path we are on and more importantly, together, united the amount of untapped energy could easily turn UTEP into a powerhouse in the field of athletic competition.  There are 3/4 of a million people  in El Paso that are starved for something to do.  Western Playland ain’t it!  From August March, El Paso should be orange and blue.  Student Athletes don’t need to be treated as some kind of heroes, but when they step off campus they should be able to feel the energy of support from the people of El Paso.

Well, that is what I think, anyway.  Will any of it happen?  Will anything be different?  Will Senter see it this way?  If he does can he do anything about it?  UTEP and El Paso are so unique that he may not be prepared for them, or he may be just the person to see that uniqueness as they way forward and then have the ability to pull it off.  What gives me hope is listening to him talk about needing the people of The Citadel to take ownership of the 3 hundred and some acres if they wanted others to.  It is a start.  If he could do that, he could build upon the work of Dr. Natalicio.  She wanted all of her kids of El Paso to have a chance at a college degree.  She has done a great job of that.   Now, and for many years she has been working to elevate the stature of those degrees.  But, if the AD could change the culture from “commuter school” on campus and off, into the focal point of the city pride, where amazing things are taking place because of the opportunities provided by UTEP for our children, it would make all of the difference in the world.  It will be a monumental task, but for a young, ambitious man it is the kind of challenge that could be the springboard to the top positions in the country.  Bo, we have heard that before, haven’t we?  And it is true.  Great coaches do great things and then get grabbed up.  I am going to keep my fingers crossed that Senter is so good that four years from now he is lured away by some cartel school.  But, just like a football coach versus a program, I want Senter to establish a program that continues on the path to greatness after he is gone.

 

Compete Versus Competitive

Coach Kugler up until the very last assured those who were listening that his players would compete, and they did.  But they were still serving as a speed bump for the teams they played.  They barely slowed teams down and didn’t move at all when they had the ball.  Yet, as Kugler said, they were competing.  They were competing pretty hard as best as they were able.

Last Saturday, the same players and coaches went out and were not only competing, for the first time in a very long time, the team was competitive.  The speed bump became a road block and the offense that had rusted from lack of use cranked up, and sputtered to life.  It was no Lamborghini, it was more Briggs and Stratton, but is showed it was still capable of motion and functionality. Head Coach Mike Price allowed that the whole game was all about the players and coaches, and that he had nothing to do with it.  Of course, he was right.  Mike Price was just there because the team needed a responsible adult.  That is the quintessential Mike Price.  He speaks the truth.  He is a master at how he speaks the truth and about which truths he speaks.  He is masterful in choosing different speech, and truths for different people.  He also happens to have shown himself to have a deep understanding of the game and an ability to do more with less over his career.  Coach Price was very busy on Monday, at the Media Luncheon.  He was doing some of his best coaching.  He was coaching up his players, coaches, media, and fans.  The kids and players were great players and coaches, the fans were still the best fans, he was just there to hold down the fort and it was nice to see old friends in the media.  Every word was the truth.  Every word was heart-felt.  It is that holding down the fort part that is the key.

If you were one of the fans in the Sun Bowl last Saturday, you know that there was an intangible difference.  The players were playing differently.  The crowd was different.  Even before the game there was an anticipation and perhaps some hope in some of the fan’s minds and hearts.  As the first half played out, that was fed by the play and play calling that seemed to be a bit more inspired.  As the team left the field to delirious chants of UTEP from the sparse crowd, the crowd sensed a difference.  The players may have been motivated by something else, but the fans were responding to the difference they could see, and one of the differences was the old coach with a bit of a hitch in his get along pacing the sidelines and encouraging the players.  Who knows how much if any effect Coach Price’s take over of the helm may have had.

Today may give us a better idea, but those who believe that everything was in place and nothing changed and those who believe that Mike Price had an instant impact will still plead their cases.  There may be little evidence in this game for either one, as Southern Miss has usually played UTEP tough and are always very physical. So, there will be the physicality that Kugler tried to build and at this point left questioning matched against the physicality of Southern Miss, perhaps the Achilles’ Heel of Mike Price’s offense of the past.  So, that will be a twist that throws the arguments into full on debate mode after this game.  Perhaps.

So, today’s game should be a fun one for Miners fans.  There is finally something to talk about other than how bad things are.  I didn’t believe the Miners would be able to do more than compete at the beginning of the season.  The first five games the did that.  The next game, the didn’t just compete.  They were competitive.  I don’t know if it was because of Mike Price.  Here is the thing.  When Mike Price got here, UTEP football was not competitive.  They competed.  Somewhat.  Mike Price made the UTEP Miners instantly competitive.  The one thing that he did that was different from other coaches was that even when the team wasn’t winning enough games toward the end, the team was always competitive!  Even when the team played the big boys, it was fun, because when we lost, it was us just laying down.  It was fun, throwing haymakers and knocking the Hell out of the best of them.  We may have lost the fights, but the other guy knew he had been in a fight.

That is what I will be looking for, today. Will they compete or will they be competitive.  If they just compete, I will be shocked and disappointed.  If they are competitive, I will be even more convinced that Mike Price has brought back that competitiveness that was gone, again.

It is way too early to let this kind of talk get started, but I can’t resist.  If Mike Price were to somehow get the Miners Bowl Game eligible, would he not have the rightful claim to the Best UTEP Coach of them all?  I know.  Bobby Dobbs and the Flyin’ Miners beat Ole Miss.  I am talking about coaching.  If he did it with Nord’s players and then did it with Kugler’s kids, after the start to this season, it would be quite an accomplishment.  This could be the ultimate motivational tool.  For Sean, and for Mike, let’s get to a bowl game!

That is how the Kyyote howls when the Miners give me hope.  And it doesn’t take much.  Come on, Miners.  Let’s shock the world!

Go Miners!

Sports, UTEP, and Dr. Natalicio

I hate that it is all that I do lately but here is more downer shit.  Dr. Natalicio has been in charge for more than a quarter of a century at UTEP.  Ask yourselves what the football has been like during that period.  Now, do you think she hasn’t heard anything before?  She teaches kids.  Football is a diversion for the students, and since they don’t care, she reads that quite clearly.  It doesn’t matter to anyone except silly fans.  I know exactly how it works on a campus.  Leadership comes from the captain of the ship.  What do you think she does, what her job is?  To run all of UTEP’s different departments and set the agenda, tone, and measure the results.  Literally, she and doesn’t ask Stull, she tells him the agenda, makes sure he understands how she feels about it, and has watched the results.  Since Stull was here as long as he wanted to be here, he was obviously doing exactly what she wanted done.  She is the President and she has never been a rubber stamp figurehead.  She is a very strong leader.  Any teacher out there knows which principals run a tight ship, one that gets it done in all areas, academically, athletically, cafeteria, and sparkling shiny floors.  Any one on that ship not performing at a level of expectations will be gone.  Nothing personal.  They are cold blooded when it comes their ship.  Oh, and the people who work there, love it and the Captain.  They shine just like the floors.  It is pretty obvious to me that Dr. Natalicio has weighed the different aspects of the Athletic Departments role and is comfortable with its level of performance.  As for it being the face of the University as seen across the country, ask yourselves how many of her students come from anywhere other than El Paso county.  Nope, for her, and to those she is serving The Best Bang For the Buck recognition for the degrees she hands to her kids is all that matters.  Everything is perfect in Minerland.  Even the football players are getting good grades.