Rebounding may hold key to MWC success

Steve Guiremand

Monday, Jan. 5, 2004 | 9:49 a.m.

UNLV opens its 2004 Mountain West Conference basketball season a week from tonight against Utah at the Thomas & Mack Center. And for Charlie Spoonhour's Rebels to have any chance at making a run at a conference title, they must improve their rebounding ... and in a hurry.

Going into Wednesday night's final non-conference tuneup against Division III Occidental College, UNLV (8-3) has managed to outrebound just three of its first 11 opponents. Not so coincidentally, the Rebels are a perfect 3-0 in those contests including an impressive 82-69 upset of SEC power Auburn.

Meanwhile, Rick Majerus' Utes (10-3), who are expected to challenge BYU for the conference title this year, are 10-1 this season in games they have held a rebounding edge, losing only to Texas Tech, 66-54. The Utes, who rank 22nd nationally with a plus-6.2 rebounding margin, also were outrebounded in a 78-44 loss to UConn and a 66-51 setback at LSU.

Spoonhour spent much of the first half of Sunday night's 90-minute practice at the Thomas & Mack Center working on blocking out and rebounding.

"It will be a emphasis the whole rest of the year," Spoonhour said. "That was the first thing we did in our practice (Sunday night). Usually guys, when you do something early in practice, realize that you're emphasizing that part of the game. And we were yelling a little bit about that."

The Rebels have been somewhat baffling when it comes to hitting the boards this season.

UNLV outrebounded a very athletic Auburn squad by 14, 41-27, in its victory against the Tigers two weeks ago and also held a 34-33 edge against a physical Loyola Marymount squad in a 78-61 road win. But the Rebels have also been outrebounded by two Big Sky Conference teams, Northern Arizona (36-29) and Montana (35-31), as well as Delaware State (27-26).

"I think the thing that happened in the Auburn game is we really played with a great deal of enthusiasm and effort," Spoonhour said. "We pushed Auburn off their spots a little bit because we were very active and aggressive."

Active and aggressive would probably two good words to describe UNLV's top rebounder this season, 6-foot-7 junior forward Odartey Blankson, who has eight double-figure rebounding games this season highlighted by a 14-rebound effort against Western Illinois. However, two senior big men expected to be key factors on the boards, J.K. Edwards and James Peters, combined for just four rebounds in UNLV's most recent victory, a 86-67 win against Montana on Dec. 30.

Spoonhour said taking good shots on offense is also a key part of the equation.

"We've got to become more judicious with our shot election because ball possession becomes more of an issue (in conference play)," Spoonhour said. "We don't want to get outrebounded."

The Rebels have seven more days and one more game to get that part of their game straightened out.