UTEP's unambitious scheduling has become wearisome
UTEP's complacence with unambitious scheduling has gotten old.
Despite the school being nowhere close to the bubble on Selection Sunday in recent years, nothing changed.
Year after year, the NCAA Tournament selection committee has made it clear that strength of schedule is awarded when making its decisions for at-large bids and seeding.
For another season, though, the Miners facing the likes of Louisiana College, Southeastern Louisiana, Northwestern State, and Northern Arizona for their out-of-conference home slate (NMSU series not included) shows that the school is perfectly content with recent results.
UTEP saw how a visit from Arizona in 2014 revitalized El Paso’s inherent passion for the Miners when fans were given a reason to cheer, a reason to show up.
The Miners weren't considered for an at-large selection that season because Arizona was the only chance they gave themselves to beat a prestigious opponent -- and despite besting Xavier in the Wooden Legacy, the Musketeers were chosen over the Miners for the Big Dance.
The year before that, Tennessee was selected despite losing to UTEP in the Battle 4 Atlantis.
Last year, UTEP witnessed a home schedule devoid of any college power -- and the Don Haskins Center witnessed half its seats devoid of fans.
The argument can be made that NCAA powers don't want to visit the Haskins Center. Playing in respected conferences, schools who are perennial members of the NCAA Tournament have the luxury of loading up their nonconference slate purely with home games that are guaranteed wins: Too much money is to be made for those schools to not, and the quality of their conference opponents makes up for lacking competition. It's why Kentucky wouldn't come to El Paso to commemorate 1966.
At the same time, UTEP declined an open invitation to visit Rupp Arena while being in no position to avoid elite competition.
As a member of a conference that decided to respond to NCAA realignment by over-reloading with schools that repeatedly bring down the league’s collective RPI -- resulting in a one-bid Conference USA despite tournament-worthy teams at the top of the standings -- UTEP continues to believe it can play by the same rules as power-conference schools with home cupcakes on its schedule.
The Miners should be willing to play anyone anywhere.
Participating in tournaments like the Charleston Classic helps. Renewing the series with New Mexico is a step forward.
But a program plagued by mediocrity -- continually chasing the glory of '66 -- shouldn't have holes in the part of its schedule that is strategically controlled.
Maybe my aspirations for UTEP are too high. Maybe the best days of Miner Ball exist in a bygone era. Maybe I should be content with a schedule lacking the highest level of competition possible for the sake of having out-of-conference home games.
Maybe I'll be shut up when the Miners beat defending NCAA champion Villanova in Charleston, or maybe the Miners will win 30 games with this schedule and the strength won't be an issue.
But until then, it's a thoughtless disservice to fans that we're looking at another C-USA Tournament title or bust this year -- with a regular season lacking meaning.