UTEP Basketball

Good Morning CBI fans and all fans of superior athletic competition. If you've been following the CBI as closely as I have, you know that in the best of three final, UTEP will be battling against their arch rival Oregon State.

The series begins Mar. 30, and I just don't think I can wait that long. How dare the Gazelle Group keep us rabid CBI fans waiting this long.

Semifinal Wrap-up

Oregon State 65, Stanford 62

Oregon state barely squeaks by Stanford in a upset victory 65 -62 in overtime. Oregon State was so upset that they still have to play at this college basketball joke, and by joke I mean extremely tough competition.

The game was tied at some point, which by rule at the end of the game sends them into OT. Donovan McNabb was in the crowd and cheered both times on at the end, he is still confused about OT rules in sports.

After the tie , Oregon State at some point must have taken the lead because in the end they did win by three. Exciting stuff huh, GO BEAVS!! This is great news for all Oregonians because we all know they love there Beavers up there.

Not only is Oregon the home of Roloff Farms, now it's the home of college basketball's greatest tournament finalists.

UTEP 81, Richmond 69

In their third season under Coach Barbee they have finally reached the promise land. Coach Barbee and assistant Coach Ken left the rockers at home because all they needed was a stellar performance from Stefon Jackson.

Jackson dropped in 34 points over the Spiders eight-armed defense defense, don't ask what happened to the other two arms. The Miners pick axed their way through the Spiders defensive web all night and in the end they won by twelve, which in this case Donovan doesn't require any OT.

The Miner boys celebrated their victory all night , Coach Barbee and Coach Ken didn't want to party so they started the trip home in their hot pick convertible.

UTEP will be traveling to Oregon State first and they will begin the epic battle for CBI supremacy. Obviously, the Beavers would love for the Miners to go down, with Coach Barbee and Coach Ken on their side I don't see how the Miners don't just smash those Beaver out.

Ironically both teams are expected to lose but that it's impossible, so by Apr. 3, a new CBI champ will be crowned and the chain net will be the winners.

Here is the complete schedule, you must tune in, if you don't they may not have this next year and we need the CBI. If you don't tune in the teams might have to pay more to get in to this tourney next year, and that's just not fair.

Mar. 30, Utep at Oregon
Apr. 1, Oregon at Utep
Apr. 3 (if necessary), Oregon at Utep. I sure hope it's necessary, I don't know if I can wait until next year for this rock-'em sock-'em tourney again.

The JMU Men's basketball team (7-4) resumes play on Monday night, December 29th at 11pm EST against the Miners of the University of Texas El Paso (6-4). The teams join Belmont and host Santa Clara in California for the Cable Car Classic.

The Cable Car Classic is the longest-running regular season tournament in the country. In this year's edition, the Dukes are trying to win their first regular season tournament or any tournament for that matter since 2001-02 when they won a tournament in Richmond.

JMU is coached by 1st year head coach Matt Brady (previously at Marist). The Dukes are currently on a 3 game win streak, which includes a quality win at home over Seton Hall of the Big East. Abdulai Jalloh, JMU's leading returning scorer and pre-season 2nd Team All Conference selection, is out for the season with a shoulder injury.

In his absence, the Dukes have been led by seniors Kyle Swanston and Juwann James along with solid play from a trio of freshmen - Julius Wells, Devon Moore, and Andrey Semenov. The Dukes will likely use a starting lineup of:

• G Pierre Curtis
• G Devon Moore
• F Kyle Swanston
• F Julius Wells
• C Dazzmond Thornton 

Tony Barbee is in his 3rd season at the helm of UTEP. They too have had some recent success and are enjoying a two-game win streak with victories over Texas Tech and New Mexico State. The Miners faced a pair of ranked opponents earlier in the season in Arizona State and Wake Forest and lost a very tough battle against the Demon Deacons by only 3 points.

The game with UTEP presents what looks like a pretty even matchup on paper.

Keys to the game for JMU:

• Find a way to contain Senior guard Stefon Jackson. Jackson is averaging 23.6 points a game and is on pace to become the all-time leading scorer in UTEP and Conference USA history. One way to slow him down will be to keep him off of the free throw line, where he is averaging about 10 makes per game and shooting 81%.
• The Dukes also need to slow down Sophomore guard Randy Culpepper who scores 19.6 per game and combines with Jackson to create one of the highest scoring duos in UTEP history.
• The good news is that no other Miner is currently averaging double digit points.
• Keep UTEP off of the offensive glass. The Miners are grabbing 14.6 offensive rebounds per game, up from 11.9 last season. Limiting their second chance opportunities is crucial for the Dukes.
• JMU has to continue to hit the 3pt shot. The catalyst in this effort will be Senior forward Kyle Swanston who is shooting 48% from downtown and has emerged as a leader on this team since Abdulai Jalloh went out with a shoulder injury. The Dukes are 7-3 when making at least 6 shots from beyond the arc.
• If the Dukes are hitting from the outside this will open up the paint for Senior forward Juwann James to do major damage off the bench. He is averaging 14.3 points and 6.5 rebounds per game after coming back from an early-season illness.
• JMU needs strong bench play from James, Semenov, and Ben Louis. The Dukes need to continue to get production out of their bench players and take advantage of their depth.

These two teams have never faced each other, but I anticipate a close battle on Monday night in the Leavey Center in this first round match-up of the 2008 Cable Car Classic. In the end, the JMU Dukes will come out on top by 4 points: 77 - 73.

The Texas Tech Red Raiders’ road woes continue, as they shot 25 percent from three-point range in a 96-78 loss at UTEP Wednesday.

Texas Tech (7-3) lost its second consecutive game, and has now dropped nine of its last 10 road games dating back to the 2007-2008 season. The Red Raiders' last road win was against Colorado on Feb. 20, 2008.

Tech shot 49 percent from the field, 25 percent on three-pointers and 71 percent from the free-throw line. John Roberson led the Red Raiders with a career-high 33 points, making all four of Tech’s three-pointers. Damir Suljagic was the only other Red Raider to score in double digits with 10 points.

Alan Voskuil, who was averaging 15.3 points per game entering the night, was 1-for-10 from the field and 0-for-6 from behind the three-point arc, giving the senior just three points. The three points was Voskuil’s lowest total since failing to score against Baylor on March 8, 2008.

Roberson also led the team in assists with nine. Suljagic led the team in rebounds with eight.

UTEP (5-4) has won two out of three games and two in a row at home. The Miners shot 51 percent from the field, 34 percent from three-point range, and 73 percent from the free-throw line.

Stefon Jackson led the Miners with 28 points, Randy Culpepper scored 27, and Arnett Moultrie scored 15. Julyan Stone led the team in assists with 11. Jackson, Stone, and Gabriel McCulley led the team in rebounds with seven apiece.

The Red Raiders' only lead was at the beginning of the game when D’walyn Roberts made a layup to give Tech a 2-0 lead. The Miners went on a 17-5 run and took a 10-point lead with 15:35 remaining in the first half.

Tech trailed by as much as 11 in the first half. The Red Raiders got within two, outscoring the Miners 12-3 from the 11:49 mark until 6:57 remained in the half. But the Miners went on a 16-9 run to lead 43-34 at halftime.

Tech didn't get closer than seven points in the second half, and the Miners went on an 8-2 run to widen their lead to 51-38. UTEP expanded its lead to as many as 27 points.

The Red Raiders cut their deficit under 20 with eight points by Roberson, including two three-pointers.

The Red Raiders will return home and face New Mexico on Saturday. The Miners will host New Mexico State.

Don Haskins, portrayed in Disney’s “Glory Road” as the legendary coach who won a national title in 1966 with five starting black players on UTEP (then Texas Western), has passed on September 7 at age 78.

The Hall of Fame coach had a career record of 719-353, 14 NCAA tournament appearances, 7 NIT berths, 14 WAC championships, and 4 WAC tournament titles in his 38 years of coaching El Paso before health issues forced his retirement.

Haskins was the prime example of being color blind when dealing with race. He grew up in Oklahoma playing one-on-one with one of his childhood friends Herman Carr, an African American.

Forever dignified, Haskins was always an everyday person, approachable by many. He never meant to take advantage of his celebrity, but always willing to help others in need regardless of whom they were, even when he himself was not better off.

Rather than worry about his job or image, he played black players with the sense of “If you don’t take them I will and win with them.” Unlike the events parlayed in the movie, Haskins always started his best players throughout the season, who just so happen to be all black.

He never meant to be a pioneer, just someone unbiased to give individuals a chance to excel in both sports and life. To prove such a point Don was one of the few coaches, if not only, to play more than one or two non-white player at a time on the floor during the early ‘60s because he cared more about winning than race.

That decision came with the hardship of being one of the most despised men in the South. He had received thousands of hate letters leading up to the national championship and Civil Rights leaders thought he was using his players like puppets. Even so his high flying offensive, defensively stingy team continued to trudge along to 23-1 in the regular season.

Haskins played only his black players against Adolph Rupp’s all-white Kentucky squad in a 72-65 win for a 28-1 season and the national championship. Rupp viewed the game after the loss picturing Texas Western as “urban street thugs, quasi-professionals imported from Northern cities to win Haskins a championship.”

The win opened the door for Perry Wallace to become the first African American to play in the SEC and rose the flood gate for others to be heavily recruited to major college basketball powerhouses thereafter.

Haskins’ coaching tree includes the likes of current USC head coach Tim Floyd, friend Norm Ellenberger after Lobo-Gate, and the outspoken Nolan Richardson, who won the 1994 NCAA tournament and lost to UCLA in the final game the next season.

It was only fitting that the namesake of the Don Haskins Center passes exactly a year after his 1966 team was enshrined in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. He leaves behind his wife Mary and three sons, Brent, David, and Steve.