Miners, Aggies Set For Battle of I-10
by asalom on Nov 23, 2010 1:17 PM MST
in UTEP Miners Basketball
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PrintThe UTEP Miner's men's basketball team is off to a good start in the 2010-2011 season. They dropped the home opener against Pacific, a game in which they were leading by double digits, but have won the last two setting the stage for tonight's Battle of I-10 in the Don Haskins Center. The Miners are 2-1, while the Aggies are 2-3. New Mexico State won its first two before dropping games at Arizona, and vs UMASS and USC.
The Aggies lost two very talented guards from last year's NCAA tournament team in Jamar Young, and Jonathan Gibson who combined for nearly 40 ppg. They will be tough to replace, but look for Troy Gillenwater and Hernst Laroche to help pick up some of that slack. NMSU also rosters five guys that stand 6-10 or taller, and two more that are 6-8. This definitely may be the first real test of the year for our Miner bigs.
UTEP is showing much promise early in this young season. Their tenacious d, no pun intended, has forced teams to jack up contested shots, and settle for the three time and time again. Their offense, although not necessarily clicking on all cylinders, looks very solid at times also. Of course, there's the likes of Randy Culpepper who always gets it done on the offensive side, but the kicker for this offense is Julyan Stone's new found game. Of course, Julyan has always been a great PG, but he has never been a real scoring threat. He's made sure that is not the case this year averaging 12 points, 5 assists, and 8 rebounds a game.
The Miners have forced teams into shooting an average of 26 three point shots a game, but need to be careful vs an Aggie team that is white hot from three point land. NMSU, as a team, shoots a ridiculous 37% from three point range. That is nearly 10% higher than any of the three teams the Miners have faced thus far.
Tonight, as always in the Battle of 1-10, should prove to be a great game. The two teams have very different dynamics and extremely talented players, but when it comes to such rivalries all stats and expectations go out the window. As of Monday afternoon less than 1500 tickets remained so get those while you still can. It's a big game for the Miners as we can't afford to drop another game at home this early in the season. It's going to be a tough test so be loud, be proud, and go Miners!
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This team seems to be learning extremely fast under Floyd, they get better with each game. I can see great things happening with this team later on this season. They seem to be on another level then last year. Defense wins Chamionships.
It was a great win for the Miners
We really needed to pick this one up going into the game with Georgia Tech. The defense has been outstanding, but we still are a long ways from doing anything close to what we did last year. The Miners have been unable to really shut the door on teams this year and tonight was no exception. With under 10 minutes to play the Aggies were still hanging around, down about 8. A team like Georgia Tech will jump on that and make us win the game by making plays. That’s basically what Pacific did, and we couldn’t do anything about it.
Also our play inside just has to get better. Claude, who for whatever reasons isn’t getting many minutes, isn’t consistent inside. Bohannon, well the kid needs to put on some pounds. No doubt about it. He just doesn’t have the strength to hang with these bigs inside. Tonight we got outrebounded something like 43-24. It didn’t hurt us tonight, but believe me, against higher quality opponents we have no chance to win with that kind of performance on the boards.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m excited about what’s going on with this team. Floyd has these guys playing some of the best defense I’ve seen in college basketball in a while. Of course Randy is Randy and there’s not much else to say. But Christian and Julyan have elevated their games to a completely new level, and Jeremy is just as consistent as he’s always been.
This team is showing a lot of promise but we still have an extremely long road ahead of us, with a lot of work to do. But, for being this early in the season, we sure do look like we’re on the right track.
Guarded optimism
So far, so good this season, but the Miners are clearly a small team. Other teams like St. Mary’s have had limited success with height disadvantages and there is no reason UTEP can’t do the same. Coach TF seems to have that in mind by having the guards crashing the boards this year.
For me – 2 questions loom.
1) What has happened to Micheal Haynes this year and will he be able to contribute?
2) Our latest recruiting class is still short. Where are the bigs?
That is the biggest question- Haynes will be needed in the Legends Classic
And I’m afraid that this team will start to gel as we’ve seen without him- they need to get used to playing with him before we get deeper into the season- kind if like when DC came in last season there were some kinks.
As for the bigs- you have to ask Floyd that questions- Daz Starke is a power forward but he doesn’t look much bigger than 6’5 from the videos ive seen. The kid from Sioux Falls (Lang) looks like the only true potential center prospect but everything I’ve read says he will need a year to bulk up before really contributing at this level (Kind of like Bohannon really).
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