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UTEP Miners (13-14) vs. Florida Atlantic Owls (25-3)

The Line: Florida Atlantic Owls -14 / UTEP Miners +14 ; Over/Under: 136.5 (Get latest betting odds)

The UTEP Miners and the Florida Atlantic Owls meet Saturday in college basketball action from FAU Arena. UTEP enters this one following a Thursday game versus FIU. In that one the Miners powered out a five-point victory. As for Florida Atlantic, they played UTSA in their Thursday outing. The Owls ended up winning in blowout fashion. Check back all season long for free college basketball picks at Sports Chat Place.

UTEP Miners

UTEP managed to stay above .500 over their first 20 games, posting an 11-9 record. The Miners hit the skids after that on a 1-6 run. The losses in that time were to North Texas, Middle Tennessee, Western Kentucky, Charlotte, UAB and North Texas again.

On Thursday versus FIU, the Miners posted a 40-32 edge by halftime. UTEP was outscored 50-47 from there but held on for the 87-82 win. Shamar Givance topped the team on 22 points with 10 assists and eight rebounds.

Florida Atlantic Owls

Over on the Florida Atlantic side, they rolled to a nice 19-1 run through their first 20 games. The Owls managed a 5-2 stretch in the next seven, featuring wins over Middle Tennessee, Western Kentucky, Charlotte, Rice and Louisiana Tech.

In their Thursday game against UTSA, Florida Atlantic was up 45-32 by halftime. The Owls rolled on a 61-34 second half and took the win 106-66. Michael Forrest was tops on the Owls with 19 points and three assists in the victory.

ANDREW’S FREE PICK

I’ll stick with FAU in this one. You could make a case for UTEP, but I don’t think the Miners will quite get there. The Owls bounced back well from their Middle Tennessee loss with a big win over UTSA on Thursday, and FAU has now won four of their last five with 90 or more points scored in three of the four wins (all at home). These teams last met up back on January 21 at Don Haskins Center. The Owls jumped out to a 37-24 halftime lead in that one and eventually took the win 67-59. I like Florid Atlantic to notch another high-scoring home effort here in a cover.

El Paso’s current workforce would be cut in half within seven years if voters approve a ballot measure in May that requires the city to more forcefully address climate change, the El Paso Chamber said in a statement.

The city of El Paso would lose 170,000 jobs and nearly $8 billion in workers’ earnings between now and 2030 if voters approve the so-called climate charter that would make climate policy a part of the El Paso City Charter, according to the chamber.

The chamber’s claim is based on a study it paid Idaho-based firm Points Consulting to conduct. However, the chamber, a member-driven organization comprised of area businesses, has not released the study or explained its findings in detail.

Environmental groups who successfully petitioned for the charter policy to be on the ballot call the chamber’s claim “rhetoric” and “fear mongering” ahead of the May 6 election for which early voting begins April 24.

The proposed climate charter policy includes amendments that would have the city aim to reduce and track emissions, direct investment toward renewable energy and require the city government to create climate-related jobs. The climate charter also would establish a city climate department and an independent climate commission, as well as ban the sale or transfer of city-owned water for fossil fuel industry activities outside city limits.

The climate charter also would have the city “employ all available efforts” to convert El Paso Electric into a city-owned utility.

“Climate change is real, and we are committed to common-sense reforms that push for a comprehensive approach to the matter,” the El Paso Chamber said in a statement. “However, we must do so in a way that considers the cost to the region – especially to those whose livelihood is dependent upon jobs that would no longer exist under the passage of the proposed amendment.”

As of December, there were about 330,000 people employed in El Paso, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. That means the climate charter would wipe out 51% of all jobs in the El Paso metro area by the end of this decade, the chamber said, citing the study it commissioned in October.

By comparison, El Paso lost just under 40,000 jobs during the spring of 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic caused a historic wave of job losses nationwide.

Petition drives climate policy proposals

The climate charter amendment proposal was added to the May ballot after a citizen-led petition organized by the environmental group Sunrise El Paso and Austin-based Ground Game Texas turned in more than 39,000 voter signatures last summer. The climate charter is one of about a dozen proposals that will go before voters in the election.

A major provision of the climate charter calls for 80% of the electricity that powers El Paso homes and businesses to come from carbon-free sources, such as wind and solar farms or nuclear power plants, by 2030. The city must be powered entirely by zero carbon electricity by 2045 if voters adopt the climate charter.

“The charter will decrease pollution, increase renewables, conserve our water and create jobs,” said Miguel Escoto, an organizer with Sunrise El Paso who helped get the climate charter on the ballot.

The chamber declined to share the study with El Paso Matters. But Brian Points, president and founder of Points Consulting, said in an email that the chamber will probably release the study “later this week or early next week.”

In written responses to follow-up questions, chamber officials said Points Consulting used an “economic impact model” that captured the effects of “phasing out energy production via fossil fuels and ramping up solar and renewable energy production.”

As a result of reducing fossil fuel-fired power generation, the city’s energy supply would decrease by 69% by 2030 and by 72% by 2045, the chamber said.

“This drastic decrease in energy production helps explain the steep decline in economic activity,” said Mia Romero, the chamber’s director of advocacy. “Renewable energy is not yet the most readily available, reliable or affordable option for those seeking to meet output demands, and would lead to the stunting of a range of industries in El Paso.”

El Paso Electric has previously said it plans to produce 100% carbon-free electricity by 2045. The utility plans to add 700 additional megawatts of solar generation by 2025, which would triple its total solar capacity from today. One megawatt is roughly enough electricity to power 200 homes on a summer day.

“We already have a plan in place, a 10-, 20-, 30-year forecast at what it’s going to look like, and how we’re going to get” to zero-carbon electricity, said George De La Torre, an El Paso Electric spokesman. He said by 2025, 64% of the power the utility generates will come from zero-carbon sources, and increase to 80% carbon-free power by 2035.

It’s not yet certain how El Paso Electric will accomplish generating 100% carbon-free electricity.

But De La Torre said the utility is examining blending hydrogen – which only emits water vapor and heat when it’s burned – into its natural gas-fired turbines to lower their carbon dioxide emissions. Someday, the utility may be able to run power plant turbines fired entirely on zero-carbon hydrogen.

“We’re moving the needle and moving in that direction,” De La Torre said.

Kelly Tomblin, El Paso Electric’s CEO, is one of 23 members on the chamber’s board.

The El Paso Chamber didn’t respond to questions about why the climate charter’s requirement that the city reach zero carbon electricity by 2045 would cause a crushing wave of job losses in the city when El Paso Electric already has committed to decarbonize by 2045.

“It’s just a clear example of fear mongering,” Escoto said of the chamber’s statement.

The chamber is not an “unbiased group of people,” he said. “They’re not small business owners, mom-and-pop shops. They represent the most powerful monopolies of our community.”

The climate charter does call for a faster transition than El Paso Electric. The utility plans to reach 80% carbon-free power by 2035, five years later than the climate charter’s timeline.

“You’ll hear a lot of rhetoric from the utility company that they’re trying their best,” said Christian Marquardt, another organizer with Sunrise El Paso. “However, if that’s really the case, how does the charter set them back in any way?”

Climate office established

But while the climate charter’s decarbonization timeline is similar to the one El Paso Electric has already proposed, the climate charter also calls for things that exist in some form already or that would force big changes within city government.

The charter amendment would have the city establish a climate department and hire a director.

The city recently created the Office of Climate and Sustainability and named Nicole Alderete-Ferrini its director. The office will spend $5 million that voters approved in the November bond election to develop a climate action plan and boost renewable energy in El Paso.

That climate-focused bond proposition, one of three on the November ballot, passed with 50.6% of the vote, the slimmest majority of the three propositions.

If voters adopt the climate charter in May, it would “create an annual goal for the creation of climate jobs” that would be announced when City Manager Tommy Gonzalez proposes the city’s annual budget, according to the climate charter text.

“By law, the municipal government will be legally mandated to find climate jobs,” Escoto said. “This would increase the amount of jobs. It would increase the amount of job security.”

But it’s far from clear how the city would generate job opportunities or coax private employers to hire workers. A $200 million taxpayer-funded jobs program underway in San Antonio – likely the largest city-led workforce program in the country – has placed just 58 people into new jobs nearly a year after it launched.

A city-owned power company?

One of the final provisions of the proposed charter amendment calls on the city to examine turning El Paso Electric into a city-owned utility similar to Austin Energy and CPS Energy in Austin and San Antonio, respectively.

Creating a city-owned utility in El Paso could be difficult because the city would likely have to pay several billion dollars to acquire El Paso Electric’s assets.

Difficult, but not out of the question: Eighteen U.S. communities have created municipally-owned utilities in the last two decades, according to the American Public Power Association.

The council addresses possible charter amendments every two years, but its last attempt in 2020 was scrapped after the COVID-19 pandemic began to spread in the community. The last time the City Charter was amended was in 2018.

The climate charter is “really rich in its ability to give power back to the community,” Escoto said, “and bringing the energy that we need away from the hands of private corporations and J.P. Morgan Chase Bank, and towards us as a community.”

The UTEP Miners (13-15, 6-11 C-USA) will be going for their second consecutive win when they face the Florida Atlantic Owls (25-3, 15-2 C-USA) on Saturday afternoon. The Miners are coming off an 87-82 win over Florida International as 2.5-point favorites. The Owls are coming off a 106-66 win over UTSA as 17.5-point favorites.

Florida Atlantic and UTEP split their last 10 meetings.

The Miners snapped their two-game losing streak with a win over the Panthers in their last game. They will try to keep the momentum going with a win over the Owls, which will give them their second win in a row and third win in their last five games.

UTEP is averaging 67.1 points per game. They scored 87 points in their last game, making 58.7 percent of their field goals and 66.7 percent of their three-pointers.

Shamar Givance led the Miners with 22 points, eight rebounds, 10 assists, and four steals. Ze'Rik Onyema finished with 19 points and six rebounds, while Otis Frazier III added 15 points and seven rebounds.

UTEP has played well defensively, giving up 69.1 points per game. They gave up 82 points in their last game and will have to do a better job if they want to win this game.

Malik Zachery (Concussion) is questionable for this game.

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The Owls bounced back from their loss to Middle Tennessee State with a win over the Roadrunners in their last game. They will try to keep the momentum going with a win over the Miners, which will give them their second win in a row and fifth win in their last six games.

Florida Atlantic is averaging 77.9 points per game. They scored 1069 points in their last game, making 51.4 percent of their field goals and 43.8 percent of their three-pointers.

Michael Forrest led the Owls with 19 points and three assists. Vladislav Goldin finished with 14 points and nine rebounds, while Giancarlo Rosado finished with 14 points and one rebound.

Florida Atlantic has played well defensively, giving up 66.2 points per game. They gave up 66 points in their last game and will need a similar effort if they want to get the win.

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Rating:

The Owls have won four of their last five games and 16 straight home games. They have played well offensively, especially at home where they are scoring more than 80 points per game while making 48 percent of their shots. They’ve taken advantage of their opportunities at the charity stripe, making over 74 percent of their free throws. They do a good job finding the open man and they’re very aggressive on the offensive glass, which will lead to more scoring chances. They also do a good job protecting the ball and won’t give the Miners a lot of easy-scoring opportunities.

The Miners have struggled defensively on the road and didn’t play well in recent games, giving up more than 80 points per game in their last three games, so expect them to have a hard time slowing down the Owls in this game. The Miners have lost seven of their last nine games and nine of their last 12 road games. They have struggled offensively on the road, scoring less than 70 points per game. They’ve also struggled at the charity stripe, making less than 70 percent of their free throws. Their ball movement isn’t very good and they don’t rebound the ball as well as the Owls, so don’t expect them to get a lot of extra-scoring chances. They’ve also been careless with the ball on the road, which will lead to easy-scoring opportunities for the Owls, who average more than seven steals per game at home. The Owls have played well defensively at home, holding opponents under 67 points per game, and won’t have trouble keeping UTEP’s offense in check. Go with Florida Atlantic to cover the spread.

Prediction: Florida Atlantic Owls -11

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The Miners are averaging 67.1 points per game and 68.1 points per game on the road. They averaged 66.3 points per game in their last three games against the Owls. They play at a fast pace, averaging 71.2 possessions per game, and they’re facing a team that is giving up 65.9 points per game at home, so expect them to be held under their average in this game. The Owls are averaging 77.9 points per game and 81.6 points per game at home. They averaged 70.3 points per game in their last three games against the Miners. They play at a slower pace, averaging 70.6 possessions per game, and they’re facing a team that is giving up 74.7 points per game on the road, so expect them to score enough points to push the score over the total. The Miners and Owls played over the total in two of their last three meetings.

Prediction: Over

Bosun is very passionate about sports and he feels bad to get paid for doing this, but we here at Winners and Whiners are glad to have him as a part of the team. As someone who minored in Mathematics, Bosun has a lot of faith in numbers and will make his picks based on stats and not emotions. He has been successfully picking and betting on winners for quite some time, so if you want to crush the books, then stick with Bosun.

EL PASO, Texas (KFOX14/CBS4) — Across the borderland, there were still many people without power following Sunday's strong winds.

KFOX14 spoke with El Pasoans who said they were without power for an entire day.

"We lost power at around noon yesterday, so it’s been almost 24 hours without power," said an El Pasoan who chose to remain anonymous.

"I have to go to work tomorrow morning. I really need light I have to be at work at four in the morning," said another El Pasoan Debra Gasca.

The places hit the hardest were Clint, Santa Teresa, East and Northeast El Paso.

The wind storm made highways dusty and knocked over powerlines.

Karin Sanchez reports on wind causes lengthy power outages in El Paso (KFOX14/CBS4)

RECOMMENDED: High dusty winds tipped powerlines and bent street signs in the sun city

Some El Pasoans went an entire day without power.

"This morning I just had to go out and get some ice to use some ice to put my food in ice chests to keep my food good," said Gasca.

KFOX14 spoke with Omar Gallegos with El Paso Electric.

He said the wind storm was the worst in recent memory.

"I don’t believe it’s been this bad if I remember correctly I think they were saying that this was in the last years I forget how many years back this might be like the 8th or 7th worst wind storm that has been recorded in terms of wind speed," said Omar Gallegos the Vice President of transmission and distribution at El Paso Electric.

He added that they had about 30 outside contractors come into El Paso to help.

"We had over 100 personnel dispatched at that time when the winds rolled in for outage restoration efforts," said Gallegos.

He said at the peak of the outage they had about 39,000 customers without power.

RELATED: PHOTOS: Damage from high winds in Borderland over the weekend

"We have personnel that is categorizing the outages and the size of the outages and starts to dispatch personnel to the larger outages first and we do that even while the wind is occurring," said Gallegos.

At around 8 p.m. on Sunday, they said they restored power to about 33,000 customers.

El Paso Electric said they had not estimated the cost of damage, but they said they tried to maintain enough equipment stocked up for restoration.

They said they worked on the larger outages first and then worked on the smaller ones after, which was why there were still people without power.

"What makes it difficult, now we’re getting to the outages where we have 80 of those outages are for 10 customers or less that means we have to visit 80 different locations to restore power," said Gallegos.

After 24 hours the El Paso Electric map showed that power was restored for the people we spoke with.

El Paso Electric said the majority of power outages should be restored by Monday evening.

If you are still without power you can track power outages throughout the borderland using this map.

Damaged electric pole at< >9725 Gaza Dr. in Socorro on Feb. 27, 2023 (KFOX14/CBS4)

RECOMMENDED: Windstorm causes damage to homes, businesses across Borderland

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Much like how the winds that rush through El Paso’s landscape make an elaborate concert, the El Paso Winds made an unforgettable performance with “Lift Every Voice.” The program featured several pieces, most created by Black composers in honor of Black History Month. From songs that made you feel vibrations from the percussion to dreamlike acts with a soft melody, the El Paso Winds performed an amazing show.

Formerly the El Paso Wind Symphony, the concert band was organized by Ron Hufstader, Ph.D., and other El Paso band directors dating back to 1995. Today, the band consists of nearly 45 musicians who play a variety of instruments, many of which were shown off during “Lift Every Voice.”

The night started with a fiery performance of Kevin Day’s “Dancing Fire,” before moving on to a timeless piece, “Adoration,” by Florence B. Price. What followed was a memorable display of John Williams’s “With Malice Toward None,” featuring a stellar performance by principal trumpet, Nancy Taylor, Ph.D. Throughout this first part of the program, the symphony was conducted by UTEP’s very own Andrew Hunter, Ph.D., who also conducts the UTEP Wind Symphony.

The next stage in the program led to a swap of leadership, introducing conductor Bruce Beach to the crowd in a wonderful cover of “On Parade” by Amanda Aldridge.

Following a short intermission and the return of Hunter as conductor, an amazing performance of “Deep River” by Benjamin Horne resonated throughout the Fox Fine Arts Theater. What came after were two compositions, both with many acts, much like the hymnbooks seen in churches in the past.

The first involved a cover of William Grant Still’s “From the Delta,” which included three differing acts, from a celebrating melody to a hypnotic, wandering sound. Whether it was the mystifying sound of bells, or the sudden “clangs” of the triangle, each instrument held an important role in the program.

To end the night, a four-act piece titled, “American Hymnsong Suite” by Dwayne S. Milbourn was played to perfection by the symphony. You could hear the clarinets, flutes, saxophones, tuba and many other instruments through the program. The music was enough to lead you to a calm sleep, or jolt you awake and was a great way to welcome a new maestro for the symphony’s 26th season.

The concert Feb. 27 was the third of this season, with two more on their way in March and May, all of which will be performed at the UTEP Fox Fine Arts Recital Hall. For more tickets and information, visit elpasowindsymphony.com

Elisha Nunez can be reached through egnunez2@miners.utep.edu

About the Contributors

Elisha Nuñez, Staff Reporter

Elisha Nuñez is a multimedia journalism student with a minor in marketing at the University of Texas at El Paso. He works as a reporter for The Prospector,...