UNLV pushes past CAL W76-75

It was a wild game up in Berkley, the fans were into it, and the commentators were into it – if you were watching I’m sure you were into it as well. The game was a tight one, with UNLV controlling the lead for a good majority of the game, then losing that lead in the final minutes and regaining the lead, and win by Quintrell Thomas capitalizing on an airball by Anthony Marshall.

The California Golden Bears were not the chumps we dominated last year at the Thomas and Mack. They were a competitive team who played neck and neck with the Rebels until we finished them off. The Runnin’ Rebels played very good defense against them, and freshman Anthony Bennett showed off on a regular basis during the game, dunking and showing a nice midrange game. The bulk of the scoring was taken up in this game by several players, Anthony Bennett (25 pts, 13 rebs), Bryce Dejean-Jones (22pts) and Anthony Marshall (13 pts, 4 assts, 2 stls).

Obviously, fortunate and unfortunate things happened to two players other than these stat grabbers. Mike Moser, five minutes into the game, dived for a loose ball and a Cal player landed right on his right arm, bending his elbow in a very unnatural way. Medical examination has concluded that the elbow was not fractured, but dislocated. Mike was in a tremendous amount of pain proximate to the time of injury. Preliminary indications are that he may be out 3-6 weeks, hopefully its shorter than longer, and hopefully his hip flexor issue is worked out by then as well. In the fortunate category, Quintrell Thomas was in the game largely due to Mike Mosers’ being on the bench, and perhaps also because Bryce Dejean-Jones fouled out. Quintrell made the game winning shot on a putback. Great moment for Quintrell and the Rebels to win that way on the road.

One thing that was obvious to the eye, was that the Rebels, as a team, seemed to want this victory much more than Cal did. They maybe had 1-2 players of a similar mindset willing to win by any means necessary. That doesn’t translate into the stats, but its as plain as day. Nice win against one of the better teams in the Pac-12. Certainly doesn’t make up for the home loss against Oregon, but Oregon is now on the verge of being in the top-25 (first team out). Today’s rankings have UNLV #20/17 (AP/Coaches), unfortunately see-sawed with MWC foes New Mexico (17/20) and behind San Diego State (18/15)

The next contest will be against D-III Laverne back in town, but in the Orleans. It should be a nice break and should get some of the bench players more minutes. Then, all indications are that Khem Birch will join the team for the road game at UTEP (Dec 17), with his first home game at the Mack on December 19^th (Northern Iowa).  

College Basketball

College Basketball

College Basketball

Ugly victory: UNLV beats Jacksonville State 77-58

Things started ugly from the jump, with PawnStar's Chumlee announcing "Lights Please"



The key trends to take away from this game were slow-ball may be a strategy against us, Moser is back, balanced output, turnovers hurt, but rebounding doesn't, free throws down.

Slow ball - Its very simple, if your competitor likes to run, make them slower and maybe they'll falter. Falter the Rebels did not, but sputter - they did. In what's very likely to become a trend this season is teams utilizing several easily available tools to keep the game at a snails pace. Step 1 - use a lot of timeouts. Use a timeout to prevent a run, use one to waste time, and use one to lengthen the game. It seemed as though there was as much time wasted in timeout situations as there was game play. It took the crowd out of the action, and it likely added to the Rebels turnovers and miscues on the court. Step 2 - foul often. While avoiding the dreaded double bonus, the Gamecocks fouled the Rebels any chance they could, especially within the paint. This limited the Rebels to only 1 dunk (to be fair, I left with about 3 minutes to go so there may have been more dunks.) and very little post play that wasn't met with a hard foul. This made the Rebels earn it from the line, as well as a jump shooting team. In the end, it didn't hamper victory, but it made for a dull event that likely wasn't much more fun to play than it was to watch. Because the "slowball" strategy did effectively strip the Rebels of momentum, and kept the overall point total down, it is likely to be utilized by various coaches this season. The untended consequences are that the opposing team likely will not make much headway either in the slowball offensive mindset, unless of course their name is Wisconsin - whom we don't play this season (thank god).

Moser is back - Mike Moser, long lost during the end road last season and MIA in Canada is back with a vengeance, showing he can still ball and why in all likelihood he'll be in the NBA next year. Moser's offensive success started early, as he scored the first five points for the Rebels and didn't look back. As primary rebounder, he has shared those duties with Anthony Bennett - but still posted a double-double (19 pts, 10 rebs). Last seasons team was intriguing because anyone could heat up at any time, making the Rebels very dangerous and preventing double-team schemes. This year's team is definitely the same way, which is a great advantage to have. Welcome back Mike Moser - show us some new tricks you learned at the Lebron camp!

Balanced output - if you take a look at the chart below, you'll see that there is fairly even output, distribution between the players who saw action. Again, a great thing to have so many people contributing and not having to rely on 1-2 key guys every game. This chart validates the depth of the Runnin' Rebels.

College Basketball

Turnovers hurt - 19 turnovers certainly doesn't help. Frankly, this contest may have been a lot closer if the Jacksonville State Gamecocks had capitalized on the times the Rebels gave away the ball. Example: Lets say the Rebels turn the ball over approximately 20 times, like last night. Its not out of the question for a team to shoot 50% from the field if they are doing well. Lets say that on 10 of the turnovers the opponent scored 6 field goals, 2 three point field goals, and went to the free throw line a total of 4 times, making three attempts. That equals (6x2=12 + 2x3=6 + 3x1=3 == 21 points). I don't have the points off of turnovers stat for last night's game, but this kind of sloppiness can lead to close games that shouldn't be close.

 Rebounding doesn't hurt - Besides shooting the ball at a higher percentage than the Gamecocks, the Rebels largely won because they owned rebounding, offensively and defensively. The Rebels out-rebounded offensively 15 to 9, and defensively 26 to 15. In total, 41 to 24. Yes, we have the better athletes, but our players have a knack for being in the right place at the right time, which makes a world of difference. This is an improvement from earlier games, where the Rebels jacked up shots and had nobody there in case we missed. Great job on the rebounding!

What happened to FT%? - In the exhibition and the first game against NAU, the Rebels made full use of their time at the free throw line. Against NAU, the Rebels shot a respectable 81% from the line, whereas against Jacksonville State they shot just 72% from the line. Anthony Bennett had lost a little magic, as he was golden on the easy buckets in the first game, not so much in the second. Hopefully Coach Rice impresses how important it is to make your free throw shots, and how it wins close games for you. I was really proud of the Rebels (although didn't mention it last time). PLEASE WORK ON FT SHOOTING!

Overall - Who can hate a win? I can't. It wasn't enjoyable basketball, but we won and they didn't. We're still ranked 18th and undefeated, we handed Jacksonville State their first loss. Life goes on, hopefully it will be more entertaining against Oregon and whomever we play Saturday.

GO RUNNIN' REBELS!

BTW, check out this Jacksonville State stupidity!

Season Predictions 2012-13

The Mendenhall Center - a new training advantage this season

The schedule has been out for awhile now, and no time like the present to forecast how the Rebels will do pre-tournament. There are four designations that a game can get. Win, Loss, Toss-up - Win, Toss  up - Loss. Explanations will be given where necessary.


The Rebels' non-conference schedule for the 2012-13 season: 
(Bold means home game)
Nov. 7 Dixie State (exhibition) - Win (1-0)
Nov. 12 Northern Arizona - Win (2-0)
- true home opener, inferior competition, this hopefully will be a blowout.
Nov. 17 Jacksonville State - Win (3-0)
- they finished 15-18 last season and scored about as much as Air Force (likely not by design).
Nov. 23 Oregon - Toss-up - Win (4-0)
- This is going to be a sick game, Oregon features Ben Carter and Jonathan Lloyd, both from Bishop Gorman, as well as Dominic Artis from Findlay Prep. They should be a legit team, but UNLV should give them more than they can handle early in the season.
Nov. 24 Cincinnati or Iowa State Toss-up Win (5-0)
- The Rebels have historically done well in fall tournaments regardless of venue - this one will be no different. Both teams are legit, just barely missed out on being pre-season top-25 candidates, so it'll likely be 5 point or less victory.
Nov. 28 UC Irvine - Win (6-0)
- Blowout
Dec. 1 Hawaii - Win (7-0)
Dec. 4 at Portland  - Win (8-0)
Dec. 9 at California - Toss-up Win - (9-0)
- should be a well coached team, better than the one that visited the T&M last season.
Dec. 13 University of La Verne-z (D-III) - Win (10-0)
- blowout, likely a lot of bench players see minutes
Dec. 17 at Texas-El Paso - Toss Up - Win (11-0)
Dec. 19 Northern Iowa -Toss-up Win (12-0)
Dec. 22 Canisius - Win (13-0)
Dec. 29 at North Carolina Toss Up - Loss (13-1)
- They will be less loaded than they were last year, but they will be at home and want revenge. Every part of me wants to say we'll win, but my brain says we'll lose - but respectably. Reality speaking, UNC was 17-1 at home last year, only losing to Duke by 1 point. Let's put it this way, nobody predicted we would beat them at the Orleans last year, and we did - so there is hope.
Jan. 3 Chicago State - Win (14-1)
Jan. 5 Cal State Bakersfield - Win (15-1) 

Conference Schedule
Jan. 9 at New Mexico - Toss-up - Win (16-1)
Jan. 12 Air Force - Win (17-1)
Jan. 16 at San Diego State Toss-up - Loss (17-2)
- damn them, as much as I would like a win - they project to be too tough of a team for even the Rebels to beat in their house. The curse continues. Going to be a hell of a game though... Did you know ESPN projected them #16 of the top 25 (UNLV #23)? They must think they know something I chose not to believe is true.
Jan. 19 at Colorado State - Win (18-2)
Jan. 24 Wyoming - Win - (19-2)
Jan. 29 UNR - Toss-up Win (20-2)
- Ok, UNR is supposedly going to be a tough team (see the "don't sleep on") - but I'm not seeing it. The only thing they have going for them is a team mostly made up of juniors and seniors. That said, they lost two key guys, Olek Czyz and Dario Hunt.
Feb. 2 at Boise St. - Win (21-2)
Feb. 6 at Fresno St. - Toss-up - Loss (21-3)
- I just have a feeling, given the gumption that sometimes Fresno State brews up, along with the limited rest between road games that this one is going to be an unexpected loss to what will be an inferior team.
Feb. 9 New Mexico - Toss-up - Loss (21-4)
- They will be seeking vengence for us beating them at the Pit. We will be wary from more lack of rest, and they will unfortunately even the score.
Feb. 13 at Air Force - Win (22-4)
Feb. 16 San Diego St. - Toss-up - Win (23-4)
- Pride will allow us to overcome and beat these guys in our house. Also expecting by this time in the season SDSU to have an injury to one key player, perhaps James Rahon possibly Tapley is banged up as well.
Feb. 20 Colorado St. - Win (24-4)
- They won't be the challenge they were in the past, without Tim Miles at the helm.
Feb. 23 at Wyoming - Toss-up - Loss (24-5)
- Wyoming always overachieves late in the season. I have a feeling we will sleep on them and they will win an ugly game in Laramie.
Mar. 2 at UNR - Toss-up - Win (25-5)
- I definitely see the Rebels riding into the MWC tournament with a 3 game win streak. No matter how good UNR is, we're beating them in Lawlor.
Mar. 6 Boise St. - Win (26-5)
Mar. 9 Fresno St. - Win (27-5)
- The earlier loss was a freak occurrence. We'll win senior night, guaranteed.

So, I predict the Rebels will end the regular season with a record of 27-5 (26-5 if the exhibition game doesn't count). 

Also, the Rebels will be ranked top-25 throughout the regular season, and land a 4 seed in the tournament. 

Have a different take on what our record will be? Share with other fans here. 

The full schedule released: preliminary thoughts

At last - the schedule has arrived

Friday, August 10th UNLV finally released the conference portion of the schedule. Now we know what lies ahead for the Runnin' Rebels all season. Here are some preliminary thoughts:

Hectic November:

Here is a breakdown of where the games fall in each month.
6 in November (includes exhibition)
8 in December
8 in January
7 in February
3, then likely 4 MWC Tournament games + NCAAs in March

Even though November is a low month when totaling games, because of the Global Sports Classic, not counting the exhibition game, we play 5 games in the span of 16 days. Besides March, games do not come in  such frequency as they do during this stretch. In our favor, guys will be fresh and all of those games will be played at home. But, there are several formidable opponents, Oregon, Cincinnati, or Iowa State - any of them could pose a challenge.

Limited road exposure:

Last season, road woes (including against inferior opponents) made for a rocky road leading into the tournament. This season, road exposure is limited with one glaring omission - UNC. The Rebels will play 13* road games (one is at the Orleans against a garbage D-III opponent) and 18 home games (not including MWC Tournament, or the exhibition game). Given that we were perfect at home last year, not including post-season play, with what on-paper was a less talented team, it should not be much of a stretch to believe that we can again remain perfect at the Thomas and Mack. Last year, the Rebels played 17 home games (not including post-season or exhibition play) and 15 road games (2 at the Orleans).

The most "dangerous" part of the schedule (again not including the UNC game) occurs between January 9, 2013 and February 6th. This is where the highest frequency of road games occurs. Five of the eight games that take place during that stretch are on the road and many of those opponents are of high caliber. If explainable losses occur, it will likely occur during that stretch.

TV coverage

Coinciding with the release of the conference schedule, partial television coverage information was also disclosed. At this point, with the demise of The Mtn, what's left is a hodgepodge of NBC Sports Network, CBS Sports Network, ESPN family of channels, and maybe a local channel bringing a game to air. (See previous article on this topic).

Two observations: First, is ESPN in wait and see mode? Besides the UNC game, which they're likely already contracted with to televise games, they have not yet signed on for any Rebels games. Are they waiting to see how good this team really is, even though they may end up paying more for the gambit? Just sayin, a little surprised that no ESPN pickups as of yet.  Second, no release of any TV info (for the 11th time besides the UNC game) for the non-conference schedule is a little disheartening. That schedule has been out for over a month if not longer, and UNLV should likely have lined up the previously mentioned networks to air those games. There is no logical reason in my mind as to why it wasn't also publicized right now, other than those games have less confirmed suitors than the conference schedule - which would look bad to publish. For everyone's sake - I honestly hope I'm wrong, but cannot see another reason right now... As someone who plans on attending games, like the rest of you I'm hoping we can at least lock down television broadcast for road games. Alleviating all fears, tournaments are normally broadcasted - so the Global Sports Classic in November will most likely be on TV.

Early road tests (in-conference)

What's already been mentioned by the LVRJ and LV Sun is that when we hit the road the hardest in-conference tests will come early. This is true, as San Diego State, New Mexico, and Colorado State will all be tough foes. Got to face them some time, no better time than early.

Weak road ending (implications)

The Rebels don't have much road exposure coming into the home stretch, and that could potentially be a problem. The Rebels have only 3 road games from mid-February to post-season play. So, that means (taking that same time frame into consideration and provided we get to the MWC final) 8 games at the Thomas and Mack and 3 road games coming into the NCAAs, which is a road game albeit a neutral site road game. Many will say that our road weakness last season was an early indicator of what eventually occurred against Colorado. So, not having road challenges near the end is a bit of a problem, and the natural consequence of playing our tougher conference opponents on the road early. Hopefully, this isn't a hindrance come tournament time.

Conclusion
Just really glad they have finally released the schedule. Mark your calendars and plan accordingly, its going to be a hell of a season!