Columnist Dean Juipe: So-so Rebels avoid being upstaged

Dean Juipe

Tuesday, Jan. 22, 2002 | 10:26 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.

It was a moment of almost unprecedented drama at a UNLV basketball game and close to 10,000 fans were riveted on the action.

There was surprise and there was suspense.

And an unexpected twist at the end.

"Hey, if you're going to ask a girl to marry you in front of this many people, you'd better be sure she's going to accept," said a guy sitting near me, moments after a Rebel fan commandeered the attention of the audience with a syrupy proposal to his gal pal that was broadcast on the big screen above the court within the Thomas & Mack Center.

The woman, from all appearances, rejected the offer and turned tail, hustling up the aisle from her seat near courtside. Left behind: A bewildered and embarrassed young man with a sorrowful expression who had given it his best shot, only to be left just short of the altar.

It was somber, if not pitiful.

But, then again, it was apropos for a night in which the Rebels did just enough to survive an occasional scare from Mountain West weakling Colorado State, emerging with a 75-68 victory Monday night that had underwhelming written all over it.

If not for a few feisty moments in which the Rams got physical with the Rebels and a confrontation seemed to be pending, the game was so nondescript that the give and take between the supposed lovebirds would have completely stolen the show.

As it was, they were unrivaled as a topic of discussion, even after it was learned at halftime that the whole thing was staged and was a hoax drummed up to promote a new TV show.

On a night in which the players were noticeably loose beforehand and the spectators were chilled in a building that had just finished being used for an ice show, UNLV took advantage of a depleted CSU squad to get back to 2-3 in league play and 9-7 overall. Yet for those keeping track of such things, the Rebels failed to cover the 9-point spread in spite of leading by double digits throughout most of the game.

CSU, 0-2 and 8-8 with losses to the likes of Gardner Webb -- wasn't he an old TV star? -- and Weber State, had but eight scholarship players on hand and may have slipped beneath Air Force on the conference's radar screen. Beating the Rams may be nothing more than a mere formality.

But these Rebels don't do anything too easily, so they herked and jerked through an up-and-down performance that pacified the crowd while leaving it wary of the future. San Diego State is on UNLV's agenda Saturday and the Aztecs may only be a step up from CSU, but it's a step the Rebels will have to take.

The conference is in disarray with only Utah playing well at the moment, which leaves a moderately talented yet inconsistent team such as UNLV on the perimeter of something great. The catch, however, is obvious: Not every pile of goo jells.

The Rebels need to find a rhythm, get something tangible from their bench, increase Dalron Johnson's touches and reinstate the arc in Lou Kelly's shot.

Failing that, they'll need to start scripting a few more sitcoms simply to hold their fans' attention.