No. 22 Liberty blows past UTEP as Miners fall to 3-9, await decision on Dana Dimel's future
The UTEP football team's hope for something special in the last game of this disappointing season was always a forlorn one. So it was in a 42-28 Sun Bowl loss to No. 22 Liberty that dropped the Miners to 3-9 and started a watch on Dana Dimel's job status.
By halftime the Miners trailed in rushing yardage 287 to minus-2, which is never going to be a winning number against an undefeated team (Liberty improved to 12-0 heading into next week's Conference USA title game against New Mexico State).
More: CUSA football standings
Now begins the waiting, as Dimel's future will likely be determined in the next two days by athletic director Jim Senter.
As for the game at hand, matters were settled in the first quarter when the Flames bolted to a 21-7 lead, with two first-half fumbles being the only way UTEP's defense could get off the field.
The Miner's offense in the decisive portion of the game consisted of a 64-yard pass from Cade McConnell to Kelly Akharaiyi on the game's second play that set up a touchdown.
Other than that UTEP had 36 yards on their other 23 first-half plays. That included a three-yard pass on fourth-and-6 that summed up quite a bit.
On the bright side, Akharaiyi did pass the 1,000-yard mark for the season, becoming the third different Miner in the last three years to do that (Tyrin Smith did it last year and Jacob Cowing in 2021).
There was some early interest as Tyrice Knight had 10 first-quarter tackles, putting him on pace to break the NCAA record of 30, but he only had three tackles in the second quarter and will have to settle for leading the nation in solo tackles for the season.
For part of the first half Liberty was also on pace to break the NCAA record for rushing yards in a game, (768 set in 1988 by Oklahoma against a Kansas State team where Dimel was a graduate assistant), but the Flames, who had 203 rushing yards in the first quarter, also slowed as the score spun out of control.
That all added to a predictable end for a Liberty team trying to make some history and a UTEP team trying to avoid it.
Bret Bloomquist can be reached at bbloomquist@elpasotimes.com; @Bretbloomquist on Twitter.
This article originally appeared on El Paso Times: No. 22 Liberty blows past UTEP as Miners fall to 3-9
