Big opportunity

Wednesday, Jan. 10, 2001 | 10:36 a.m.

Regina Miller hasn't had to look too hard to find motivational material as she prepares her Lady Rebels for Thursday night's Mountain West Conference opener at home against Utah.

Besides being the defending Mountain West Conference regular-season and tournament champion, Utah also was the team that knocked UNLV out of the conference tournament last spring.

Furthermore, Miller reminded her players that they were picked to finish fourth in the conference this season by both the league's coaches and the media.

Going into Thursday's 7:35 p.m. contest at the Thomas & Mack Center, UNLV is off to its best start in seven years, posting a 10-2 mark and winning two tournaments on the road.

Nonetheless, it is Utah (12-2) which has received the bulk of the national attention this winter. The Utes were ranked as high 23rd before losing back-to-back games to then No. 21 Stanford and unranked Loyola-Marymount.

"I reminded the players this week during practice that the three teams that have a chance to win this conference are Utah, Colorado State and New Mexico," Miller said about the preseason polls. "They asked me what they said about UNLV and I told them they didn't mention UNLV.

"That has got to be a little extra incentive that each game out, if nothing else, they have something to prove."

Led by junior forward Linda Frohlich (19.7 points and 8.1 rebounds per game) sophomore guard Constance Jinks (13.8 ppg) and freshman center Petra Glaser (11.5 ppg), the Lady Rebels are averaging 72.1 points a game and leading the conference in field-goal percentage.

"We're taking better shots this year and we pretty much have offensive threats in all five positions and last year we didn't have that," Miller said. "It's nice to have those weapons."

Utah, on the other hand, leads the nation in scoring defense, holding its opponents to an average of 51.4 points a game.

"Utah will be a great test for us," Miller said. "I told our team this week in practice that we have a 14-game season and it starts with Utah.

"We're a very different team than Utah ... but we're similar in some ways, too. We have to be able to get some easy points against Utah; if we take quick shots or bad shots -- if our shot selection is poor -- it'll hurt us against Utah because they have a tendency to make you pay for your mistakes."

In the nonconference season, Miller said she was pleased with the way her players reacted to playing without Frohlich for three games (while she was playing overseas).

"We really have handled the early part of the season pretty well, considering some of the adjustments that we made," Miller said. "You can tell the players have matured and they understand the system better because at this time last year, we played some of the same teams and lost to those teams."

How the Lady Rebels fare in the first three conference games will give Miller an indication of where they stand in relation to the rest of the conference.

"We start with three of the toughest teams in the conference," Miller said of Utah, BYU and New Mexico. "This is a great test for us early. Out of 32 conferences, our conference is ranked seventh in the country and seven of the eight teams have a winning record right now.

"Each night is going to be a contest. It's going to be very competitive and we have to compete hard every night and try to create a victory. Utah obviously is the team being chased."