UTEP's Barbee masters mining, refining hidden gems

UTEP is Conference USA's most talented team.

People keep saying it.

I've written it.

Arnett Moultrie is one of the many stellar finds for head coach Tony Barbee at UTEP. (US Presswire)

If you watched the Miners play you would probably agree. They have a big point guard who can pass and rebound (Julyan Stone), a little scorer who can shoot from anywhere (Randy Culpepper), the starting wing is solid (Jeremy Williams) and a pair of future pros operate in the post (Derrick Caracter and Arnett Moultrie). So yes, this is a good basketball team -- a team ranked 26th in the latest Top 25 (and one) with a C-USA-best 10-1 league record -- and its existence serves as testament to the recruiting acumen of UTEP coach Tony Barbee.

Or maybe it's something different.

"Who else recruited Randy?" Barbee asked assistant Tony Madlock late Monday, repeating the question I had just asked him via cell phone while the UTEP staff wrapped a day of recruiting. I heard Madlock in the background say SEMO, East Carolina and Middle Tennessee State.

"Yeah," Barbee said. "Schools like that."

And Moultrie?

"Arnett's final three were us, Mississippi State and Washington State," Barbee answered. "But for Mississippi State, he was just a throw-in, somebody they wanted to help them three years later."

And Stone?

"Nobody," Barbee said. "We got him the spring after we got the job. We went to watch one of his teammates during that spring period, and Julyan was an available senior who was unsigned, and nobody was recruiting him. Zero. Nobody. He was from Santa Barbara and UCSB didn't recruit the kid."

Spot a pattern here?

Turns out, UTEP is a team of talented players almost nobody thought were talented.

Except UTEP.

"We have the best talent evaluators," Barbee said with a laugh. "And we have the best talent developers."

For the record, Barbee wasn't being serious when he made those comments. I asked the questions in a joking manner, he played along. We both laughed, then started talking about UTEP's upcoming game with Tulsa, otherwise known as the C-USA preseason favorite.

"Tulsa is a hard place to play," said Barbee, whose team will visit there Saturday. "In this league, it's always been one of the tougher places to play."

As has Memphis.

But the Miners already won there.

They snapped the Tigers' 64-game C-USA winning streak last month, and that they did it with three starters from Memphis combining for 37 points made the victory even more impressive, especially when you consider none of the Memphis products were pursued by Memphis, mostly because they weren't heralded Top 100 recruits. Which brings me back to UTEP and its talented roster of untalented prospects.

The Miners have just one consensus Top 100 recruit.

(Comparatively speaking, Memphis has five.)

The rest were overlooked or never looked at.

"They just weren't ready-made talents," said Barbee, whose most-touted player is Caracter, the transfer from Louisville who is averaging 14.2 points and 9.0 rebounds per game. "When Julyan Stone stepped on campus three years ago, no lie, he was 6-feet-6 and 168 pounds. I was afraid the kid was going to get hurt. But now he's 6-7 and 210 pounds, and he's my point guard. ... Arnett Moultrie? When I first met Arnett, he was a sophomore, and he was 6-6 and 160 pounds with two left feet. Now you hear people talk about how he's 'under-skilled' and 'still raw,' but he's a polished gem compared to what he was when he first stepped foot on campus. He blossomed, just like Julyan blossomed.

"And those are the kinds of guys you have to get at UTEP. It's going to be hard to recruit McDonald's All-Americans and finished products. So you've got to get guys with some ability and some skill and some potential, then develop it and watch it grow."

Grow into a conference champion?

It's a little too early to engrave the trophy, but the Miners are on their way. Also worth noting is that UTEP has no seniors, meaning Barbee could be in the first year of a great two-year run if his talented roster of untalented prospects remains in school and continues to develop.

You know, just like they've been doing.