Disappointment but excitement for UNLV in NIT opener

Tuesday, March 12, 2002 | 1:43 a.m.

LAS VEGAS AP) - UNLV could be disappointed at playing Arizona State in an opening round NIT game Tuesday night. The Runnin' Rebels, after all, were only a 3-pointer that clanged off the back rim away from making the NCAA tournament.

But after a season that brought some stability and hope to a once vaunted program, it's easy to believe UNLV players when they say they're just happy to still be playing.

"People never expected us to get this far in the first place," guard Marcus Banks said. "We proved everybody wrong. They had us picked fifth or sixth in our league, but we got to the championship game."

UNLV (20 (10)- finished the season with a surge, winning 12 of its last 15 games and just coming short on a rally Saturday night that would have given the Rebels the Mountain West Conference tournament crown that went to San Diego State.

UNLV had an outside chance of still getting an NCAA tournament bid. But at-large bids went to two other Mountain West teams, Utah and Wyoming, which both lost in the conference semifinals.

First-year coach Charlie Spoonhour has opted to look at the positives from a season that began with few expectations.

"I'd love to be in the NCAA tournament - don't get me wrong," Spoonhour said. "But I don't see making the NIT as anything but a positive. I'm an NIT fan."

The Rebels will face a team seemingly headed in the opposite direction in Arizona State 14 (14)-, which lost its last four games and five of the last six.

But all six of those games were against ranked opponents, and the Sun Devils beat UCLA and played respectably against Stanford and in one of two games against Arizona during that stretch.

The opening round game at UNLV's campus arena will be Arizona State's first game against a non-ranked team since beating Washington on Feb. 9. By contrast, UNLV didn't play a ranked team all year, though Cincinnati climbed into the rankings after beating the Rebels early in the season.

ASU barely qualified for the NIT, which requires that teams have at least a .500 record.

Still, the Sun Devils were confident enough of a bid to practice on Saturday while waiting to see what would unfold.

"We were told that we'd probably be in," ASU coach Rob Evans. "We pretty much knew."

UNLV, which relies on frenetic outside defense, will have to tighten up what has been a porous defense under the basket against a team that can dominate in the middle behind 6-9 senior center Chad Prewitt, who made the PAC-10 all conference team.

San Diego State exploited UNLV's inside defense in Saturday's conference championship, then withstood a furious rally for a 78-75 win.

UNLV's Dalron Johnson said the team is excited about being in the postseason, even if it is the NIT.

"We'll play just as hard in the NIT as we would have in the (NCAA)," Johnson said. "It's still basketball. You still compete, whether it's pickup ball or you're playing for the national championship."

Evans said his team has respect for UNLV, a team that sometimes struggles to score but excels at taking the ball away from the other team.

"It's a tough assignment," he said. "But we're very happy to be playing."