Rebels: Second to one

Steve Guiremand

Wednesday, Aug. 1, 2001 | 10:33 a.m.

UNLV may have its most talented team in two decades. But that wasn't enough to garner John Robinson's Rebels the No. 1 spot in the preseason Mountain West Conference media poll released on Tuesday.

Defending champion Colorado State, which returns 14 starters from its Liberty Bowl championship squad, including standout wide receivers Dallas Davis and Pete Rebstock, garnered 11 of a possible 17 first-place votes and finished with 130 total points to top the survey, with UNLV (118 points, four first-place votes) second followed by perennial conference heavyweight BYU (91, one).

But it's fair to say that Jason Thomas & Co. aren't going to stay awake at night over the slight. Nor is CSU head coach Sonny Lubick ready to order his 2001 conference championship rings.

"Hey, it's good to be picked in a somewhat positive light," Thomas said. "But we still have to go out and prove it on the field. Sixth, fifth, whatever we were picked to finish last year, I don't think we thought that we would finish there. Then we went out and proved we were better than that."

"It's better than being picked last," Robinson said. "I think it gets a little scary when someone says, 'You're last.' They did that to us when we came here two years ago. Last year we were supposed to be last or next to last. So being picked second is something more positive than that."

Lubick, whose Rams have finished in first place in three of the last four years of conference play, said he thought the predictions were based more on the way the 2000 season finished than what lies ahead in 2001.

"It feels better to me (to be picked first) than being picked eighth," Lubick said. "How good are we? I don't know. I personally wouldn't have picked us No. 1."

Paramount for the Rams will be finding a starting quarterback to replace the graduated Matt Newton. A pair of sophomores, D.J. Busch and Bradlee Van Pelt, are vying for the spot.

"We do have players coming back who have played," Lubick said. "But when you're a team with a new quarterback it's hard to say how everything will mix together. Last year Matt Newton stepped up to make some huge plays for us to win some games we otherwise might have lost. But I think we have a chance to be a pretty decent football team."

One key could be the health of standout junior running back Cecil Sapp, who had pins and a steel plate inserted into a leg he broke in the spring. The powerful Sapp was the only underclassman selected to the all-MWC first team offense last season after rushing for 841 yards on 151 carries (5.6 average) and scoring 10 touchdowns.

"I thought (his rehabilitation) would be farther along than it is now," Lubick said. "Our trainer thinks he's OK and he thinks he's pretty good. But I watched him run the other night. Straightaway, he's pretty good but when he has to cut he's still not 100 percent."

Lubick doesn't have much time to settle his quarterback position or get Sapp back into gear. The Rams open their season on Sept. 1 against in-state rival Colorado and then travel to UNLV two weeks later for an early-season Friday night showdown with the Rebels.

"This conference is just so well balanced," Lubick said. "I think it is going to be difficult to go through this conference undefeated. I think this year even two losses could keep a team in the money."