Columnist Dean Juipe: This game’s not what it used to be

Dean Juipe

Monday, Feb. 4, 2002 | 9:27 a.m.

Dean Juipe's column appears Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. His boxing notebook appears Thursday. Reach him at juipe@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4084.

Ten years ago they could have played this game at any time of the day and drawn 18,000 spectators to the Thomas & Mack Center.

It would have been seen as a classic confrontation between perennially tough powers, and tickets would have been hard to come by.

But it was a different story Sunday as UNLV hosted DePaul in a late-morning men's basketball game that served as a prelude to the Super Bowl for a national television audience. A best guess: Some 4,500 seats were taken.

It was a busy day, of course, with a smorgasbord of activities on campus and on TV. At UNLV alone there were also tennis matches and a baseball game pulling potential fans from the Mack.

Yet in 1992 they would have filled the place no matter how saturated the schedule.

But 10 years ago DePaul was 20-9 and in the midst of its sixth consecutive season with at least 20 victories. It has had one since.

More telling, interest in the Blue Demons is now so minimal that their game here was neither broadcast on radio back in the Chicago area nor covered by a beat reporter from a Second City newspaper.

The Rebels, too, aren't what they were 10 years ago when Jerry Tarkanian was wrapping up his UNLV career with a 26-2 season. But at least they have had four 20-win seasons since and haven't completely fallen off the basketball map, as seems to have happened to DePaul.

Defections, injuries and suspensions reduced the Blue Demons to 10 players (and no head coach, as Pat Kennedy was also ailing) for a trip to Las Vegas that was all but destined to turn out the way it did. DePaul, losers of eight of its last nine games and now 8-12 overall, was in town to play the role of patsy.

From UNLV's standpoint, its 90-75 victory was perfectly timed. It allowed the Rebels to knock a few barnacles from the bilge and tune up for a much bigger game Tuesday at New Mexico.

The win/win situation for the Rebels was the equivalent of a championship fighter taking a nontitle bout. There wasn't much of a risk and the overmatched opponent was known to have had a glass jaw.

Oh sure, DePaul did the best it could and threw a momentary scare into the scenario when it went up 49-48 with 15:53 still to play. But one 15-4 run later the Rebels were back on top by double digits and cruising toward their 11th win in 18 games this season.

They even covered the 11 1/2-point spread.

Yet while everyone could see the value of this scrimmage, few can say it didn't have its discouraging moments. At times the Rebels were getting beat on the boards, were reckless and -- Charlie Spoonhour, help me here -- looking as if independent play and winging it is their preferred offensive attack.

Spoonhour and his players are constantly talking about their "system" and how difficult it has been for the Rebels to adapt. System? What system? Unless it's a metaphor for an occasional burst of controlled mayhem, the Rebels don't seem to have come to grips with any type of discernible system.

But such a failing was hardly important on a day in which fans of either team had to be flashing back to a more vibrant past.