BOISE, IDAHO – Hank Bachmeier threw for 340 yards and two touchdowns, and Khalil Shakir had 166 yards receiving as the Boise State Broncos (1-1) handed the UTEP Miners (2-1) their first loss of the season, 54-13, on Friday night at Albertsons Stadium.
“You can’t beat a team in this kind of environment unless you play really good football, and obviously we didn’t play well enough to beat [Boise State]. Not to take anything away from them, they played a great game,” fourth-year UTEP Head Coach Dana Dimel said. “But we didn’t play well and had way too many turnovers. We did a lot of good things offensively in the first half until the very end there when we threw the pick and they ended up getting a score out of that.”
The Broncos scored 31 points in the second quarter after the Miners pulled within four points (10-6) on a 21-yard field goal by Gavin Baechle early in the period.
At one point Boise State scored 21 points in less than three minutes, including a short scoring run by Andrew Van Buren after Miner quarterback Gavin Hardison fumbled on the UTEP three-yard line.
That gave Boise State a 31-6 lead. The Miners cut their deficit to 18 (31-13) on a 48-yard TD pass from Hardison to Jacob Cowing, but that was as close as they would get the rest of the evening.
Trailing 34-13, UTEP missed an opportunity to close the gap to two touchdowns when Hardison was picked off by the Broncos’ Seyi Oladipo inside the BSU 10-yard line late in the second half. The Broncos tacked on a one-yard rushing TD by Van Buren right before the first half clock expired, and took a 41-13 lead to the locker room.
The Miners held the Broncos to 13 points in the second half, but were unable to dent the scoreboard.
The UTEP offense was limited to season-lows in points and yards (336) as Hardison threw three interceptions, part of six turnovers for the Miners.
A bright spot for UTEP was the seventh career 100-yard receiving game by Cowing, who finished with 112 yards on six receptions. Cowing has scored a TD in five straight games dating back to the end of the 2020 season.
The Miners didn’t have much success getting the ground game going, however, as they finished with 104 yards rushing on 40 attempts (2.6 yards per carry).
Boise State compiled 461 yards of offense and finished with one turnover to the Miners’ six. The quick strike Bronco offense registered five touchdown drives under two minutes.
Following a bye week, the Miners will play back-to-back home games versus New Mexico (Sept. 25) and Old Dominion (Oct. 2). Kickoff for both games is 7 p.m. MT. Tickets are on sale now by calling (915) 747-UTEP or visiting www.utepminers.com/tickets.