UTEP Students Place Eighth at National Cybersecurity Tournament
Outranked more than 50 universities, including UT Austin and Texas A&M
EL PASO, Texas (July 15, 2025) – A team of undergraduates at The University of Texas at El Paso earned a top eight finish at the first annual Hack the Madness cybersecurity tournament. The competition featured 64 universities from across the country in a single-elimination tournament that parallels the NCAA’s March Madness basketball event format.
“Cybersecurity is a rapidly growing field and UTEP is one of the industry’s leading universities,” said Baltazar Santaella, who is the team’s supervisor and the University’s deputy chief information security officer. “To have our students participate and perform at an elite level is testament to their teamwork, discipline and the excellent cybersecurity education they receive at UTEP.”
The competition was hosted by Hack The Box, a leading cybersecurity performance center. Beyond being a means for friendly competition, the hackathon served as an opportunity to educate and develop future cybersecurity professionals – a field where employment is projected to grow by 33% between 2023 and 2033, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The team consisted of six students: Mason Bishop, Andrea Davila, Damon Fernandez, Brianna Flores, Daniel Fuentes and Luis Fuentes. Over the course of two weekends, the UTEP team, comprised of student employees from across the University’s information technology department, competed against other universities in challenges that tested students’ abilities in forensics and hacking through events that ranged from real-world incident response scenarios to strategic cyber defense exercises.
“The opportunity to compete in Hack the Madness fueled my passion for cybersecurity even further,” said Daniel Fuentes, a senior and computer science major. “Working alongside my talented teammates, while representing UTEP on the national stage and in a high-pressure environment, built my confidence and proved to me that I can perform when the stakes are high and that I can compete with the best in country.”
In addition to the team’s top eight finish, the contingent from UTEP was also the highest placing team in Texas, outpacing universities like UT Austin, UT San Antonio, UT Rio Grande Valley, Texas A&M Corpus Christi and Laredo College.
“Unlike many of the other schools we matched up against, our team didn’t have a history of competing,” said Brianna Flores, a rising senior and computer science student. “For us, Hack The Madness was a way of showing that the knowledge and skills we gain at UTEP are hands-on and prepare us to be the leaders in cybersecurity.”
Individuals who are interested in cybersecurity can declare a concentration in secure cyber systems through UTEP’s computer science degree program. For more information, click here.
About The University of Texas at El Paso
The University of Texas at El Paso is America’s leading Hispanic-serving university. Located at the westernmost tip of Texas, where three states and two countries converge along the Rio Grande, 84% of our 25,000 students are Hispanic, and more than half are the first in their families to go to college. UTEP offers 171 bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degree programs at the only open-access, top-tier research university in America.
Last Updated on July 15, 2025 at 12:00 AM | Originally published July 15, 2025
By MC Staff UTEP Marketing and Communications
