EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) – The start of the college basketball season around the nation as well as here in the borderland is now less than two weeks away.
On Nov. 6, the UTEP men and women will play a season-opening double header: First, it’s Keitha Adams’ women vs. Western New Mexico at 4 p.m., followed by Joe Golding’s Miner men against McMurry at 7 p.m.
They’ve both already had closed door scrimmages vs. other college programs. Sources told KTSM that the UTEP men lost to Texas Tech by eight points two weekends ago, before beating UT-Permian Basin by 40 last weekend.
Scoring and shooting the basketball was an issue for the UTEP men in 2022-23, but sources told KTSM that those areas were improved in the two scrimmages.
“I think offensively, we’re scoring the ball better. I think we have some versatility, we can play guys at different positions, play different groups so I like that offensively,” Golding said.
The Miner women, meanwhile, lost to Abilene Christian by a single point in their closed-door scrimmage, per sources. With 13 days until the official start of the season, Adams is happy with the progress of her team, but they’ve still got a long way to go.
“It’s like a crockpot; as we get warmer and we have more time, it’s going to get better. As the day, week and season goes, we get better. We want to be like a slow cooker, we want to get better with time,” Adams said.
The Miner women will also play an exhibition game that fans can attend this Saturday at 2 p.m. vs. New Mexico Highlands. The men will go on their annual retreat to Cloudcroft this weekend.
