Rebels still hoping to land highly touted defensive end

Steve Guiremand

Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2000 | 9:39 a.m.

When is no news good news?

UNLV and football coach John Robinson hope it is when it pertains to the recruitment of first-team junior college All-America defensive end Anton Palepoi.

The 6-4, 275-pound Palepoi, who starred at Dixie College in St. George, Utah, took official recruiting trips to both UNLV, where his sister attends school, and heavy favorite Utah, where his girlfriend is going to school.

But Palepoi's name didn't show up on the signing list for either the Rebels or the Utes last week.

It is against NCAA rules for either Robinson or Utah coach Ron McBride to publicly comment on a potential recruit. But you can bet that both are keeping their fingers crossed that the talented Palepoi eventually signs or enrolls at their school.

One thing in Utah's favor is that Palepoi's JC coach, Greg Croshaw, is the father of Utah quarterback T.D. Croshaw. And Dixie has been a perennial feeder of talent to both Utah and BYU over the years.

Still, the fact Palepoi didn't sign on Feb. 2 as most recruits did gives UNLV at least a ray of hope that it still can land the big defensive lineman down the road.

If Palepoi does wind up in Las Vegas, it would give the Rebels both first team JC All-America defensive ends, in Palepoi and Long Beach (Calif.) City College's Scott Parkhurst, as well as second-teamer Adrian Watson of Glendale (Ariz.) Community College.

* COMING UP SHORT AT CORNER: If there was one significant void in UNLV's recruiting class, it may have been not landing a junior college cornerback who could come in and replace graduating team co-captain Andre Hilliard.

Robinson and company thought they had one -- twice.

The first was Los Angeles Harbor JC's Demetrius Williams, who actually committed to the Rebels back in December and was scheduled to enroll in January.

But upon closer inspection of the Williams recruiting film supplied by LA Harbor's coaching staff, it became apparent the player UNLV thought it was getting was not the one matching the film.

For one thing, Williams measured in at just 5-7 on his recruiting trip while the player on the film looked closer to 5-11.

UNLV decided to pull its scholarship offer to Williams and instead offered it to another talented Southern California junior college corner, Greg Toomes of Mt. San Antonio College in Walnut, Calif.

Toomes committed to UNLV in mid-January. However, just hours before last Wednesday's signing period began, Toomes called to say he would be switching to Boise State, which had hired his JC defensive back coach.

By then, it was too late to move on to Plan C.

* SKAGGS OK: Another name missing from UNLV's official signing list last week was Florida State running back transfer Raymont Skaggs.

Skaggs was awarded a scholarship when he enrolled at UNLV last fall.

"He's OK," Robinson said. "Since he came in last fall, we just didn't include him on our signing list."

* SPRING DATES: Robinson said that spring practice will begin on Thursday, March 23 and is scheduled to conclude on Saturday, April 22.

Fifteen practices, the maximum allowed by the NCAA, have been planned and will be held on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.