Game Fifteen: UTEP 72, Houston 61

"I had been looking forward to this game since they announced it. Coach Ballard told us that Houston would be tough. 'They come out and give it all they've got. You know how tough that game was when we played those former Houston players. They call them the Cougars because they bite and claw at you. If you want to be conference champs, you'd better beat them on your home court, cause they might be too tough to beat at home. They take it right to you.' Normally, that's just Coach talking, but I believed it.

This was going to be a nationally televised game. And we definitely had an audience for it. It wasn't as if we filled up the Don Haskins Center, but I can tell you that there were more there than at one of my sold-out high school games. This would be the first time my parents got a chance to see me play on TV, and I knew that my extended family would be watching. It would be on ESPN2. Two teams with at least 10 wins playing for position in CUSA.

I was still suffering from that poke in the eye I got from the Rice game. I tried out some of those clear goggles, but they don't do much for your peripheral vision. At least, my eyes would be protected this time.

Anyway, we hit the court and we get lucky because Houston gets into foul trouble early on. Their coach took a T straight up and I had no idea why. Someone said she stuck her tongue out at a ref, some said that she said something that the ref didn't like and we took a 1-0 lead...because I shanked the first free throw. I guess I was nervous, huh, but those goggles were ignorant.

We take a lead in the first half, but #35 (Letell Hanson) goes down. Brianna (Neal) was ready to hop right in there. I played pretty well in the first half, but I had problems with those goggles, and the doctor recommended that I play with some sort of eye protection. I couldn't see those Houston girls moving around me, and when we went into the 2-3 I looked pretty sorry.

We took a 35-25 lead at the end of the first. Early in the second, I almost collided with a Houston player, and Coach takes me out. 'Can you see in those things?' she said.

'Not really well,' I admitted. I almost ran right into a screen, and there was a lot that I couldn't see coming.

'You've had enough. I shouldn't have put you out there, but you wanted to be out there,' Coach said. 'So you sit.'

So there I was during the second, sitting next to Mackie (Immaculata Suarez), with who I've had bad blood. We didn't say a word to each other. All I could do was watch. Houston wasn't going to go down easily, and they stayed within single digits of us in the second half. They started closing back. Up 57-54, we gave up a couple of fouls and before we knew it, Houston had tied us 57-57.

We were on f***ing knife edge, because I didn't want to lose to nasty Houston in our house. We were leading 64-61, and then Tony (Antonina Martynau) sinks this off-balance shot, and #12 (Shanna Jetton) draws her fifth foul. We held her to two points.

That sparked us. We were on a roll and the Cougars didn't score another point all afternoon. Mackie got out there and Coach just told her to dish the ball, and she did what she was told. Tony was on fire. She scored 15 points. Our starters only scored 31 points, everything came off the bench in that game. Their monster center, Woelfle, tried one last shot with time expired and Patty Clark just f***king blocked it! Reject!

I wanted to score more than nine points. But that game was great. When we play them at Houston, they'll come with everything they've got."

--Brenda Dean



Some trivia for this game and a reference to one of the 1993 rules of Statis Pro Basketball.

UTEP only had 3 Team Index points. (4 Home Index for UTEP - 1 Road Index for Houston). Obviously, UTEP would have to conserve its points. However, the technical foul earned by the Houston coach in the first half took away an Index Point from UTEP! Why? According to the rules, a technical foul can be considered an attempt by a coach to work over the refs, and the refs begin giving the team the benefit of the doubt.

What happens when the home team has no Index Points left and the visiting team earns a technical? According to the 1993 rules, the visiting team gains an Index Point of its own! If you know that the home team is holding on to an Index Point, and if you're head by about five or more late in the game, I can imagine some player deliberately provoking a technical foul to strip away that Index Point.

So how is UTEP looking in the rankings?

AP Poll RPI: 46
Coaches Poll RPI: 34

UTEP has four votes in the Coaches poll, but is not ranked, obviously. UTEP isn't ranked in the AP poll, either.

In the next game, UTEP will be on the road against Tulane. See the previous card set if you want to look at the cards. UTEP killed Tulane 90-52 in their first meeting of the year.

The 3,680 attendance is UTEP's biggest attendance of the year - but you know in women's basketball that attendees sometimes masquerade as empty seats.

Houston Card Set

UTEP invites Houston to El Paso, Texas for a game that will televised (in our little Imaginationland) on ESPN2. All of Brenda Dean's friends back home will get to see her.



Look at Racquel Woelfle's "Block = 13" rating. They also sort of have their Brenda Dean-like play maker in Debora Fehrenbach with a stamina of 24. Unfortunately for UTEP, everyone on the Houston roster is healthy. This ought to be "a good 'un" as UTEP is both teams are 2-0 in C-USA conference play, UTEP is 12-2 and Houston is 10-4.

Game Fourteen: UTEP 69, Rice 51

"There are certain things I can't say. But this has been a horrible week. It's been a horrible week at school. These psych labs are just going to kill me, the coach doesn't like the fact that practice has to be rearranged to accomodate my psych lab. I am the only UTEP player majoring in psych.

It's been a horrible personal week as well. And I'm definitely not talking about that, no way, no how. Just to say that someone who I thought was a very close friend turned on me, and then tried to turn the team on me. I don't think it worked, but I know who my real friends are now.

I thought I could work this out on the basketball court. I don't think that we really took Rice all that seriously. #4 and I (Deborah Scheller) were matched up against each other. Well, she had a hair up her butt and she was out of control. Probably by accident, but she stuck her finger in my eye when she was waving those arms of her around.

The ref didn't see it, and I went down. I left the court with no points scored and 18:23 left on the clock in the first half. I didn't return to the game. They sent me to get my eye checked out later on.

I guess Rice got bold and they took an 8-4 lead. Coach Ballard let the team have it. "Get your asses in the game!" she said. We went on a 10-0 run and that put us in the lead again. We didn't look back.

But we couldn't blow out Rice. We should be knocking a team like Rice senseless, but they hung in there. We scored the first four points of the second half to lead 37-26...but Rice went on a 10-0 run to close the game to 37-36.

Then we got serious. We didn't blow Rice out by forty, but we kept the at length for the rest of the game. Coach Ballard said that was an ugly win. Ugly-ass win, and I could only see it out of one eye. But we'll take it.

So they managed to get in touch with an eye doctor, one special visit to the office later...and they checked out my eye. I had some swelling due to a tiny cut. Some antibiotics, and two days of ice packs and ibuprofen and my vision should clear up completely in time for the Houston game. I can hope.

Our next game is at home against Houston. I'm going to wear goggles. This game is going to be on ESPN 2. Everyone I know back home in Pulaski County will be watching that game. Just let me loose, God."

-- Brenda Dean






It's been a busy week and as you can tell, there haven't been any recent posts. The dramatic touches come from a book that I might write someday. So there you go, maybe it will be interesting.

Anyway, without Dean on the court no one dominated. Only four players broke the 10 point barrier, and the top scorer on each team only scored 14 points. However, UTEP picked up 40 rebounds and that did it.

I went ahead and used the secondary rating for Rice players when the Secondary rating was better than Field Goal rating. It didn't help Rice.

Brenda will be back for the Houston game just in time. (She had a Z Injury result, as you can guess.) Here are the current RPI rankings:

AP Poll RPI: 50
Coaches Poll RPI: 42

Playing the 4-10 Rice hurt UTEP's strength of schedule, but UTEP still gets two votes in the Coaches Poll. Houston is 10-4, so a win should raise all boats.