Lady Rebels coach has team headed in right direction

By Brian Hilderbrand

Thursday, Feb. 11, 1999 | 11:20 a.m.

Regina Miller is big on quotes.

The UNLV women's basketball coach has them flashing across her computer monitor and on plaques scattered throughout the Lady Rebels offices at the Thomas & Mack Center. She even starts every practice by passing on a motivational quote to her players.

But the one quote you will never hear from Miller is "I told you so" -- even though she certainly is entitled to shout it from the top of the Stratosphere Tower.

Miller, you see, is far too busy winning basketball games and reviving a once-proud program to worry about having the last word on the many detractors. And Miller had plenty of those, both in the media and the community, who roundly criticized UNLV athletics director Charlie Cavagnaro last April for hiring a coach with a 60-100 record in six seasons at Western Illinois University.

"I didn't exactly get the red carpet (treatment)," Miller said of her introduction last spring to Las Vegas. "But I didn't put a lot of focus on it because I felt like I had the right focus, which was to service the team, and not focus on things I really didn't have any control over."

What she does have control over is a basketball program that has won 13 games this season -- more than the combined victory total of the past three seasons when UNLV was 12-67 -- going into tonight's Western Athletic Conference game against Tulsa at Lied Gymnasium.

And she has managed to do it with essentially the same group of players that hadn't won more than four games in any one season the past three years.

So, what's behind the Lady Rebels' sudden turnaround? That's simple, according to senior forward Angie Dye, who has played for four coaches in her four-year career at UNLV.

"We've got a good coach," Dye said bluntly. "Coach Miller is a great coach, she knows basketball from every angle and she has given us that team chemistry that we didn't have last year.

"It's just a whole new atmosphere."

Liz Wolfe, a senior center, agreed with Dye.

"It's just such a positive atmosphere, especially compared to last year, that I don't even know where to begin.

"Mostly, Coach Miller knows her stuff, she's a good coach. When you know your coach knows what they're doing, you have to respect that."

But that's not to suggest that Miller is the easiest coach to play for, senior forward Amy Wunderlich said.

"She wants us to work hard and she has pushed us really hard," Wunderlich said. "I think this is the toughest program I've been in, by far, but she makes us know that we're going to receive something good out of it.

"Everyone respects her a lot more than previous coaches because she's a lot harder on us and she doesn't take any stuff from the players; she disciplines from the get-go and throughout the whole (team), it's not just this player or that player."

Miller said that first and foremost she is a teacher -- and not just a teacher of basketball.

"I think the team has learned what a challenge is -- I felt like they struggled with that before," Miller said. "The days that I really tested them or got on them or really pushed them hard, it was a challenge, it wasn't as though I was trying to intimidate them or be mean. I think they learned the difference between (that and) being challenged to be the best that they can be.

"It's more of an attitude thing and they have taken on the attitude that they're more confident, they believe in themselves. If we don't perform as well as we can, we know that we didn't play to our capabilities. I think they're understanding that now."

Added Miller: "At first, the light was very dim, then it got a little brighter. I think we're in that bright spot now; the light is coming on and they're buying into the system and the program."

Miller said she has noticed a distinct change in the attitude of her players since she first met with them last spring.

"When I first came here, I ran into a bunch of young women who wanted to win and that made all the difference in the world," she said. "I think they truly wanted to (in the past), they just didn't have the direction on how to get there."

Perhaps they had the desire to win, but the Lady Rebels didn't know quite how to react to being successful on the basketball court, Wunderlich said.

"It was hard when we started winning at the beginning of the year," Wunderlich said of the Lady Rebels' six-game win streak (including a pair of exhibition games) to open the season. "It was a big transition, it was, like, 'what do we do?'

"We had lost three years in a row and it's very hard to turn around and start winning. We won a couple games and it was like a dream. Then we kept winning more and it became a reality."

Although Miller would be the last person to say "I told you so," her players are taking particular enjoyment in their success as a way of chastising Miller's early critics.

"When Coach Miller first got hired, no one liked her," Wunderlich said. "It was the big thing around the community, that she was hired for all the wrong reasons and stuff like that."

One of the hottest rumors had Cavagnaro hiring Miller to keep the Black Coaches Association off his back, amid unproven charges that Cavagnaro had used racial slurs to describe black athletes.

"Now, we've proved everybody wrong and that's what's so great about (our success this season)," Wunderlich added.

But Miller is not content with merely silencing her critics or proving that she could win, given the proper funding. (Miller's budget at UNLV is roughly twice that which she had at Western Illinois.)

Miller said she envisions building a program at UNLV that not only will contend for the conference championship and an NCAA Tournament berth on an annual basis, but one that will become financially self-sustaining.

"This program can certainly be self-sufficient because of the tradition ... and because of the potential support that is here, not only on the campus but in the community as a whole," Miller said.

"That's a long-term goal of mine and I believe it certainly can happen here."

With the prospect of playing more games in the Thomas & Mack and the soon-to-be-completed sports pavilion adjacent to the T&M, Miller believes she will be able to recruit with the top schools in the nation for players and, as a result, field better teams which, in turn, will draw more fans.

Fan support is something Miller and her players said has increased during the course of the season, although the Lady Rebels still rank second to last in the 16-team WAC in attendance with an average of 364 fans per game.

Miller said she believes Las Vegas can support the Lady Rebels in the same manner Albuquerque, N.M., and Fort Collins, Colo., back their women's programs. New Mexico leads the WAC in attendance with an average of 6,340 fans per game and fifth-ranked Colorado State is second with 3,539.

"I believe, of all places, it can happen here," Miller said. "One reason I believe that is that we have the target audience that is supporting women's basketball. You look at the WNBA and you see kids, families, businessmen and you see the elderly (attending games), and we have that population here in Las Vegas.

"It will just take some time for people in Las Vegas to catch on to women's basketball again."

Unfortunately for the current Lady Rebels seniors, they won't be around to witness that kind of support if Miller is successful in bringing it to UNLV.

"It's disappointing," Dye said, "because now that the program is up and going strong, I want to be a part of it and now it's coming to an end here in a couple of weeks."

But, Miller said, this year's Lady Rebels seniors will have the satisfaction of knowing that they had a hand in rebuilding the program.

"I want everyone involved to help me redevelop this program and bring it back -- players, fans .... everybody," Miller said. "I think fans will pay for anything if they think they're going to get something. If they think it's not worth anything, they won't come and pay."

Lady Rebels turnaround

Year Record Coach

1995-96 4-21 Jim Bolla

1996-97 4-23 LaDonna McClain

1997-98 4-23 LaDonna McClain/Steve Corraro

1998-99 13-7* Regina Miller

*Six regular-season games remaining.

Note: Steve Corraro served as interim head coach for the final seven games of the 1997-98 season and posted a 1-6 record.