Bret Bielema hates Auburn, and we do, too, but we've got the first hate of the season ready for UTEP.
1. It's in Texas
2. Hey, that's our gimmick. It's a good thing this is the season-opener and we're all raging for any sort of actual Razorback football game, because otherwise, this game is really kind of a snoozer. Often times, Arkansas fans point to a team on the schedule and say, "Well we're playing them to help us prepare for a spread offense, like Texas A&M; and Auburn run" but in UTEP, we're playing a team with a snail's pace, run-oriented offensive identity, which almost feels like a mirror match. If you're looking for a defensive challenge, you'd want to play a team that challenged your impressive run game and maybe made you pass a little bit, but instead UTEP struggles against the run - but they do blitz a lot, so that could be fun...if Arkansas decides to air it out at all, but they'll probably try not to.
3. Copper? They mine copper? I mean if you're going to be the miners, it should be related to something exotic. Gold, Diamonds, and silver are precious. Yeah, copper is in every wire in your house, but a copper miner doesn't exactly poke fear into opposing teams. Alternate nicknames from back in the day: "Ore Diggers" and "Muckers". I feel like Muckers would be a really solid name. It's not too late to change!
4. Paydirt Pete. I regularly go after other team's mascots, but it's pretty easy in this case. Paydirt Pete carries a pickaxe, which may be the most devastating weapon wielded by a miner since the canary, but I can do without the porn-stache. I mean if your mascot is going to look like Bo Darville, you might as well be the UTEP Burt Reynolds or at least the Bandits.
5. Glory Road. When this movie came out, I was pretty excited to see an exciting movie about college basketball and the school that our former National Championship winning coach Nolan Richardson went to. Then, the movie comes out and it glosses over the 5 years that Haskins had coached at Texas Western (now known as UTEP) which he made the NCAA tournament several times with his point guard Nolan Richardson. Maybe this is Reasons to Hate: Hollywood.
6. Breaking Bad: Speaking of which, all we need to know about El Paso we learned from Hollywood. In Breaking Bad, [SPOILER ALERT IF YOU LIVE IN A CAVE] Hank gets promoted within the DEA and moves to the El Paso office, where people are pretty much dicks to him. To be fair, Hank still had a pretty abrasive personality at that point in the show, but there was no real effort made to welcome him to the office. Not cool, bros. Although, to be fair, they were all killed in the famous tortuga explosion out in the nearby desert. After that, Hank was all like "screw you, El Paso, I'm going home."
7. No Country For Old Men: Seriously, don't go to El Paso. Bad things happen. Nolan Richardson stayed up here. He didn't go back. AND WE FIRED HIM IN A PUBLIC SPECTACLE.
