Since that gloomy day back in 1998 when UTEP woke up to find it had missed the great Mountain West jailbreak from the Western Athletic Conference, Miners fans have waited for news that a lifeline was coming.
That broke Friday with a report from CBS Sports' Dennis Dodd, filled with all sorts of qualifiers saying nothing was imminent, stated that the Mountain West was looking at UTEP and Rice for an expansion to 14 teams.
"Another source course close to the situation said the expansion discussions are 'accurate but misleading,' in that no immediate action is expected to be taken," Dodd's story said, but that likely didn't keep UTEP fans from breaking into two camps: those saying, "About time," and those saying, "What took so long.