Jim Senter enjoys work he can see.
At home, that might mean building a rock wall, installing a water feature or finishing a landscaping project. It offers an escape from days filled with meetings, phone calls and decisions that have results which are not always immediately visible.
“You can go to the office, make phone calls, work on your computer and have meetings all day long, and when you leave, it doesn’t look any different,” Senter said. “When you go build a rock wall or walkway, even just mowing your grass, you can look back and say, ‘That looks good. Look what was accomplished.’ You can see it and feel it.”
Senter may not be doing much landscaping during the workday, but since arriving at UTEP in November 2017, his fingerprints have been found in nearly every corner of Miner Athletics.
There have been coaching hires, facility improvements, new premium spaces inside the Sun Bowl, the addition of beach volleyball and new investments designed to help UTEP keep pace with a rapidly changing athletics landscape.
The most significant project, however, was one Miner supporters had been asking about almost from the moment Senter arrived in El Paso: finding a path to the Mountain West Conference.
When Senter arrived, he held approximately 50 town hall meetings during his first year. One request came through more clearly than any other.
“Jim, you’ve got to get us in the Mountain West,” Senter remembered hearing. “Beyond anything and everything else.”
For Miner fans, the appeal was about returning UTEP to a familiar neighborhood. Mountain West membership meant reconnecting with schools that helped shape generations of UTEP athletics history, including New Mexico, Wyoming, Air Force, Hawai‘i, Nevada, UNLV and San Jose State. It also meant playing more contests in the Mountain and Pacific time zones as Conference USA continued to stretch farther east.
But conference realignment is not as simple as deciding where an institution would prefer to play.
“You don’t just say, ‘I want to change tables,’” Senter said, smiling. “You have to be invited to go sit over there … it takes two.”
For years, there was no open seat.
Then another chain reaction swept through college athletics. Oklahoma and Texas left for the SEC, conferences replenished their memberships and the Pac-12 eventually fractured. When Oregon State and Washington State began rebuilding their league with Mountain West members, an opening finally emerged for UTEP.
The relationships already existed between administrators, university leaders and conference officials. Conversations that had once been hypothetical became real.
When the invitation arrived, the process moved quickly.
“All in, it took about three days. We were prepared for that day,” Senter said.
Those three days involved calls, financial projections and close coordination with UTEP President Heather Wilson and leadership throughout the University of Texas System. Senter said the campus had long understood the advantages of Mountain West membership. The question then turned to funding the move.
The Numbers Game
Under Conference USA bylaws, UTEP faced the prospect of competing for two years without receiving approximately $9 million in conference distributions. Athletics could not simply wait for revenue from its new league to begin arriving. The department needed enough money to operate, support its teams and prepare for a higher competitive standard in the meantime.
That made fundraising inseparable from realignment.
“We knew we were going to have to go two years without revenue from Conference USA,” Senter said. “But once again our team was prepared for that well in advance even before we sat down formally to discuss.”
Miner Nation answered the call. By March 2025, UTEP had secured $7.5 million toward its initial $10 million Climb Higher goal. The momentum continued as Athletics raised a school-record $12 million during the 2024-25 fiscal year, including $7.7 million for Climb Higher. The department received support from 2,691 donors and secured 54 gifts of at least $25,000, surpassing its previous major-gift record by 35.
UTEP also launched the Gold Standard Giving Society for supporters committing at least $30,000 over three years. Its first 28 members pledged more than $10 million combined.
The timing made those accomplishments even more significant. As UTEP raised money for its conference transition, the House settlement introduced new revenue-sharing costs tied to recruiting and retaining athletes.
“In some ways, it couldn’t happen at a worse time,” Senter said.
Major gifts, or donations, are often paid over several years, forcing UTEP to balance long-term pledges with immediate operating needs. Now, those resources are beginning to reach the programs they were intended to support.
Senter said UTEP will have more money to allocate to football and men’s and women’s basketball during the 2026-27 fiscal year. The difference is not abstract to the coaches competing to recruit and retain athletes.
“They would tell you, ‘I’ve got a chance now,’” Senter said.
There is tangible evidence of growth elsewhere in the department.
UTEP volleyball has developed into a nationally relevant program, completing the 2025 season with a 25-5 record, a program-best No. 15 RPI, and an at-large NCAA Tournament berth as a No. 6 seed.
That success generated another visible project. UTEP raised $1.6 million for renovations to Memorial Gym, surpassing the original $1.5 million goal.
Men’s basketball continued to lead Conference USA in attendance, drawing a league-best average of 5,247 spectators during the 2024-25 season. The program also produced its first Don Haskins Center sellout in nine years when 12,000 fans attended the January 2025 game against New Mexico State.
The fundraising momentum continued into 2026. Between the football signing-day event and Mountain West Media Days, more than $4.5 million was pledged toward the second phase of Climb Higher, known as Reach the Peak.
And with a wink, Senter added, “We have a great external team. There’s more to come.”
Still Some Challenges Remain
The records and gifts provide Senter with visible markers of progress, but they do not simplify every aspect of the transition.
Football scheduling provides one example. By moving into the Mountain West, UTEP lost six future non-conference dates because previously scheduled home-and-home series with San Jose State, Wyoming and UNLV became conference games. COVID also repeatedly delayed Texas Tech’s return game to El Paso, which is now scheduled for 2032.
Those are the kinds of details that rarely attract attention but can require years to untangle.
“There are just some things you can’t fix with a magic wand,” Senter said. “You just have to go through it.”
That behind-the-scenes work may not be as visible as a renovated stadium club, a fundraising total or a new conference logo. But it is essential to what Senter is attempting to build.
The move to the Mountain West is not the final project. In many respects, it is the foundation for the next one.
Senter is direct about the department’s most pressing competitive priority: football and men’s and women’s basketball must win consistently. Those programs have the greatest ability to generate attendance, media interest and revenue that can be reinvested throughout the department.
He also sees the need for a permanent beach volleyball venue, expanded scholarship opportunities, improvements to the Larry K. Durham Center and a broader student-athlete wellness campaign. Longer-term facilities such as the Don Haskins Center will require modernization to meet changing expectations for connectivity, concessions and the overall fan experience.
The list is substantial because the work of building an athletics department is never really finished.
At home, Senter said he has completed nearly every landscaping project he once had planned. He now asks his wife what he should work on next.
He does not have that problem at UTEP.
For a man who appreciates being able to look back and see what his hands have helped create, the evidence is all around him: renovated spaces, record fundraising, packed venues, expanding opportunities for student-athletes and familiar opponents returning to the schedule.
After nearly three decades of Miner fans asking for a place in the Mountain West, UTEP has finally taken its seat at the table.
Now Senter and the Miners are working to make sure they become one of the league’s strongest and most successful members.