Columnist Ron Kantowski: Cannon fodder increasing

Thursday, Oct. 3, 2002 | 10:47 a.m.

Ron Kantowski's insider notes column appears Tuesday and his Page One column appears Thursday. He can be reached at ron@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4088.

If UNLV and Nevada-Reno aren't careful, they just might wind up with a rivalry after all.

Oh, they'll talk until they are red or blue in the face about how the football game between the Silver State's colleges is significantly more important than lining up a royal on a video poker machine. But most neutral parties agree the UNLV-UNR game has lost some luster.

You could even argue that the finish on this rivalry was sort of dull from the start. Given the teams only have played 28 times, it's not exactly Army-Navy. And in that they only managed to get together four times during the 1980s, maybe Army Surplus vs. Old Navy is more like it. Let Morgan Fairchild and that woman with the big glasses serve as honorary coaches.

It's a good thing Southern Nevadans refuse to call UNR by what's written on its jerseys -- "Nevada" -- or the rivalry would have even less meaning. In the other sports, it already is passe, at least down here. When was the last time anybody showed up early/at all for a UNLV-UNR basketball game at the Thomas & Mack Center?

While the football game hasn't lost all of its intensity, other than an occasional middle finger being thrown in mock anger, the series between the Rebels and Wolf Pack has evolved into a succession of blowouts. It has been eight years since the game was decided by less than a touchdown. The average margin of victory over that period has been 23 points.

The Wolf Pack won 10 of 11 from 1989-99. Until John Robinson arrived on the scene, it was hard to remember the last time the Fremont Cannon, the fragile spoils of this victory (remember when the Rebels broke it a couple of years ago during the postgame celebration?), was painted red.

But with longtime UNR coach/UNLV nemesis Chris Ault now watching from the athletic director's box, the Rebels have had their way with the Wolf Pack the past two years. So much so that BYU is the opponent UNLV now circles on its calendar, even if nobody on Maryland Parkway will admit it.

This year's calendar, however, may have two circles on it. The Rebels seem to have slipped a notch while the Wolf Pack has improved, as evidenced by its upset of BYU and near-upset of Colorado State last weekend.

But it's not a rivalry until somebody steals your goat, or at least gets your goat, which is what UNR linebacker Logan Carter did to UNLV on Tuesday by proclaiming his dislike for Rebels QB Jason Thomas.

Thomas, you may recall, tacked on an unnecessary TD in the waning moments of last year's game won by the Rebels 27-12. Carter was sitting in the stands, but that apparently didn't preclude him from working up some ill will for Thomas. Maybe Carter's cousin had a wager on the game, because Thomas' TD coincidentally (or not, because who would ever admit to it?) just so happened to allow UNLV to cover the point spread.

"I hate Jason Thomas," Carter told the Reno-Gazette Journal.

Too bad Rod Smart isn't still hanging around town. Thomas could borrow his "He Hate Me" XFL Outlaws jersey for Saturday's game, and it would finally make some sense.

So let's take inventory. We've got middle fingers being exchanged, one side referring to the other by its adopted name, broken cannons in the middle of the field, linebackers cursing quarterbacks and a couple of evenly matched teams that may or may not like one another.

I can think of worse ways to spend Saturday night.