UTEP tops Wyoming to win Sun Bowl Invitational, 78-67
EL PASO, Texas - The UTEP Miners are champions of the Sun Bowl Invitational once again.
Thursday at the Don Haskins Center, the Miners defeated the Wyoming Cowboys, 78-67 to win their first Sun Bowl Invitational championship under head coach Joe Golding (3rd season).
Golding also secured his 200th win of his coaching career.
It was a good back and forth game in the first half with the Cowboys taking a one point lead into the half, 26-25.
The Miners would start to break away in the second half by forcing turnovers and coming away with points off those takeaways.
UTEP scored a total of 22 points off of turnovers.
The Miners led for 25 minutes, including the final 14 minutes of the contest.
“We have a saying in our program, tough times pass but tough people last,” Golding said. “Life doesn’t always go your way, but the guys that bunker down, trust the process and keep the huddle tight, they get rewarded. I’m happy for the guys in our locker room because they got rewarded.
“I thought in the second half offensively, we got better,” Golding said. “I trusted these two (Hardy and Powell) guys. We made some adjustments and started posting them up. It created a lot of offense not only for them but for other guys. We got contributions from a lot of people.”
Three Miners would end up in double figures for the game.
Zid Powell led the way in scoring for the Miners putting up 32 points in the contest.
He would go on to win the MVP for the entire tournament.
UTEP's Otis Frazier III would end the night with 15 points, followed by Tae Hardy with 14.
It was also a record breaking night for Hardy who surpassed 1,000 points for his college career.
The Miners have now won two games in a row and improved their overall record to 8-5.
They'll get a bit of break for the holidays before they return to action Saturday, December 30 at home against Seattle University.
Tipoff for that game will be at 7 p.m. from the Don Haskins Center.
