A look at the history between UTEP and Texas Tech

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The Red Raiders hit the road early this season as they travel to El Paso to take on the UTEP Miners in the Sun Bowl. Both teams are coming off of season opening victories but both teams were drastically different in how they got to 1-0.

For the Miners, they raced out to a 24-7 lead over New Mexico before hanging on to win 31-24. They finished the day with 330 rushing yards but only 116 passing yards as they allowed UNM to hang 400+ rushing yards on them.

For Tech, they fell behind 16-7 before winning 42-35 in their home opener, as Davis Webb and co. passed for over 400 yards on the day while racking up 600 yards of offense.

-Texas Tech leads the all time series between the two schools 14-6-1

-These two teams will be meeting for the first time since 2007 when the Graham Harrell led Red Raiders beat UTEP in Lubbock 45-31.

-The last time Tech hooked up with UTEP in El Paso they needed a last second field goal as the Red Raiders escaped a hostile Sun Bowl 38-35.

-The Red Raiders will be looking for their 6th straight win in the series that has seen Tech go 5-0 against UTEP dating back to 1963.

-The average score between the Red Raiders and Miners has been 25-13 in favor of the good guys, but the last two games have been shoot outs as Tech has outscored UTEP 82-66.

-If you were an incoming freshman the last time UTEP beat Tech, you would now be 75 years old. Likewise, if you were an incoming freshman the last time Tech beat UTEP, you would be 25 years old.

-There have been 4 shutouts in the series, with UTEP shutting out Tech in the very first meeting by a score of 31-0 in 1930 and Tech shutting out the Miners in 1933, 1934, and 1949.

-The largest Miner victory in the series was a 31-0 win in 1930 and UTEP has never scored more than 35 points against Texas Tech.

-The largest Red Raider victory was a 61-7 mauling in 1950 and that was also the most points the Red Raiders have ever put up against the Miners.

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My Prediction: UTEP is going to try and continue to pound the rock until Tech proves they can stop it. It’s the home opener for the Miners, they are debuting new uniforms and a new Jumbotron to a crowd that could easily be their largest of the season. UTEP has 3 new offensive linemen (including 2 freshman) that will understandably have big game jitters and a QB who has talked non stop about having an issue with Kingsbury selecting Manziel over him at A&M.

If Tech can jump on top of them early and force them to abandon the running game they could run away with this easily. I’ll say 49-28 Tech.