In some ways this is the most difficult week of August for UTEP football players, as New Mexico State game-week is still a few days away and the excitement of opening camp is long gone.
Linebacker Nick Usher said dealing with the grind mentally isn't hard.
"This just leaves us more time to understand the schemes, it's an advantage for us," he said. "The only difference (between this week and last week) is the practices are a little shorter. It's still intense, we still do a lot of Miners-on-Miners (first team offense against first team defense). We're still working hard, it's just shorter.