Dec. 29, 2009
Final Stats
Box Score in PDF Format 
UTEP held Air Force to one field goal over the final six minutes in grinding out a 58-47 win over the Falcons in the championship game of the Bank of the West Don Haskins Sun Bowl Invitational on Tuesday night.
The Miners have won back-to-back Sun Bowl Invitational titles for the first time since 2003-04. Overall it is UTEP's 28th championship in the 48-year history of the event.
This game was tight throughout before UTEP (9-2) pulled away by outscoring Air Force (7-5) 15-8 over the final 7:20. After the Falcons drew to within 43-39 on a three pointer by Todd Fletcher, the Miners scored 15 of the next 20 points before Michael Lyons buried a triple with 1:03 remaining for the final margin.
UTEP was held nearly 30 points below its season average, but it didn't matter as the Miners improved to 11-20 when scoring less than 70 under coach Tony Barbee.
"It's always a great feeling when you hoist a trophy," Barbee said. "I thought our guys really earned it tonight. We needed a game like that - a grind-it-out, tough, ugly game. People don't realize how tough it is to play against that Princeton style, where they guard for 35 seconds on every possession."
A night after scoring 56 points in the first half of a runaway win over Norfolk State, the Miners found themselves nursing a 29-25 lead three minutes into the second half. UTEP built a 36-25 cushion on a jumper by Arnett Moultrie with 14:42 remaining, but Air Force wouldn't go away. An 11-2 spurt closed the gap to 38-36 with 9:59 to play before the Miners went into lockdown mode down the stretch.
Randy Culpepper and Christian Polk each scored 14 points to lead the Miners. Culpepper had 10 points in the first half and Polk had nine in the second stanza.
Culpepper was named the tournament MVP, while Moultrie and Derrick Caracter joined him on the All-Tournament team. Moultrie had nine points and nine rebounds versus Air Force, and Caracter just missed a fifth straight double-double with nine points and 10 rebounds.
"I'm disappointed that Derrick didn't get the double-double, but he's such a presence for us," Barbee said. "What I appreciate about him is he has a will to win. He's not afraid to throw his body on the floor. That's got to continue to become contagious for everybody."
Lyons was the only player in double figures for Air Force with 10 points. The Falcons shot 38.6 percent from the field and were 5-for-19 from three-point territory.
"The key to this game was to not give up easy layups," Barbee said. "We probably gave up three or four, but they usually get 10 or 15. We wanted to make them beat us from three-point range."
UTEP returns to action on Sunday at Texas Tech at 1 p.m. MT.
