Columnist: It doesn’t get any easier for Horton & Co.

Tuesday, Sept. 3, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- I'm not quite sure which was the more magnanimous gesture, Air Force coach Fisher DeBerry calling off the dogs early in the third quarter of his team's 45-0 rout of San Jose State or Air Force Academy superintendent Lt. Gen. Paul Stein allowing the plebes to remove their dress coats while baking in the 84-degree sunshine of Falcon Stadium.

After careful consideration, I give the nod to the general. After all, when the plebes are doing 213 push-ups over the course of 3 1/2 hours, the last thing anyone wants are casualties from heat stroke.

One thing I do know is that if UNLV thinks it's taking a big drop in class this week after getting its head predictably handed to it by Tennessee, the Rebels have another think coming.

This is a pretty good Air Force team that is flying into Las Vegas this weekend. They're tough, they're disciplined, they're physical, they're tough (Oh, did I already mention that?) and they're on a mission.

It seems like the Falcons are treating the Western Athletic Conference as if it were Iraq and every game is an incursion into their territory. San Jose State found out early that you don't mess with the Air Force. And forget the pregame show of might buzzing Falcon Stadium. That's nothing compared to Andre Johnson streaking by like an F-16.

The Falcons are off to a flying start. And if what DeBerry said about how a team tends to dramatically improve from Week 1 to Week 2 is true, then UNLV is in big trouble.

Not only must the Rebels attempt to bounce back from the second-worst defeat in school history, they have one week to get ready for Air Force's option attack, which amassed 548 yards in total offense. The Spartans had all summer to get ready to try to stop the option. By the time they figured out how to do it, the last rites had already been administered in the third quarter.

Maybe Jeff Horton can talk former QB Jared Brown into coming out to practice this week and run that option against the UNLV defense. But as San Jose State coach John Ralston so poignantly pointed out after the game, you can't simulate what Air Force does because nobody does it the way the Falcons do.

Remember last year when UNLV had all summer to try to stop Rice's option game? Remember how the Owls ran roughshod over the Rebels to the tune of 354 yards in a 30-0 victory?

In some ways, this week may be a more daunting task than going to Tennessee. With Tennessee, UNLV knew it was outmanned athletically virtually all over the field and it was just a matter of getting whatever it could out of the trip to Knoxville.

With Air Force, the Rebels face a team that will always be looking to overachieve, even when it's the favorite. This is a team that totally dominated San Jose State physically on both sides of the ball.

And there's that motivation factor the Falcons have going for them. They want to treat Saturday's game like a dress rehearsal for Dec. 7. This is a hungry football team. And for UNLV, that's the last thing it needed to see this week.