Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Columnist Ron Kantowski: Bench the Leon-hearts in favor of lionhearts

Ron Kantowski is a Las Vegas Sun sports writer. Reach him at [email protected] or (702) 259-4088.

Instead of going with guys who can play when they feel like it, UNLV coach Lon Kruger elected to go with guys who feel like playing against mighty Utah on Monday night.

And it almost worked.

With Romel Beck and Jerel Blassingame, two-thirds of its not-so-holy trinity, reduced to the role of spectator and bit player, respectively, a makeshift lineup comprised of Odartey Blankson and four pieces of scrap iron made Utah strap on its welder's helmet for the first time since the conference season began.

The Utes had steamrolled their opposition by an average margin of 17.6 points per game on their first run through the Mountain West. But they only beat this lunch-pail version of the Rebels, 57-53.

Maybe Kruger has stumbled onto something here, although by now, he knows better than to start thinking that way with this bunch. Afterward, he said the usual things about close only counting in horseshoes and hand grenades, but at least for one night the Rebels didn't fix their bayonets on each another.

"We needed (something like) this to be the starting point back in December," Kruger said. "It's a little late but we've got to use this as a starting point and make progress ... that's about all we can do."

Kruger insisted that it was minor injuries and not a lack of performance or commitment that resulted in Beck and Blassingame, who I used to think was the best point guard in the Mountain West, taking a seat on Monday. Unofficially, I'd say it was more like bruised egos and wounded psyches that put them on the bench. Anyway, it is anybody's guess as to what is bothering Beck, because all of a sudden he's not talking to the press.

With two-thirds of the scoring artillery sitting on the bench, there was a lot less bickering about who would shoot the ball. That apparently wasn't the case in the disaster at Air Force last week when Kruger, I'm told, finally had to raise his voice in the huddle to remind everybody who was boss.

I've been one of Kruger's staunchest defenders in a season that is suddenly teetering on the precipice of major disappointment and total disaster. Monday's loss, although competitive, dropped a team that was predicted to win the Mountain West (at least by us nitwits in the press) to 2-6 and 10-10 overall.

But I have to admit to being a little surprised that Kruger hasn't been tougher on his nitwits. Blankson, Blassingame and Beck are definitely disciples of Leon, the original "there's no 'we' in team, either" guy from the Budweiser commercials.

Kruger has a reputation for being a bulldog -- at least that's how I remember him as a player at K-State -- but he has been more like a cocker spaniel around these guys he inherited. Maybe he didn't feel comfortable cracking down on players he didn't recruit, but it has gotten to where even the TV commentators who don't regularly follow the team are picking up on this laissez faire approach.

They say things about how next year's team and the ones to follow will look nothing like this one, using words such as "mind-set" and "attitude" to sugarcoat Kruger's inability to get this crew of malcontents to do as he asks.

But as for the first week of February being a little late to show some fight and esprit de corps, perhaps it isn't. If I remember right, the Rebels didn't bottom out last year until they played Missouri, and the Tigers are just coming here Wednesday.

After getting chased halfway to Branson last year, the Rebels regrouped and by the end of the year, they were the best team in the Mountain West. If Utah's Nick Jacobson doesn't sink that 3-pointer from the seat of his pants just before the final buzzer at the Pepsi Center, UNLV would have found itself in the NCAA tournament, and what a strange sight that would have been.

Of course, it took a coaching change to make it happen. After the Missouri debacle, Charlie Spoonhour handed the reins to his son, Jay, who never bothered to cinch them, much to the delight of guys like Blankson and Blassingame and Beck.

Although Monday's patchwork lineup -- UNLV rallied from 11 points down with a group comprised of Blankson, Ricky Morgan, Michael Umeh, Louis Amundson and Andy Hannan, who mostly took the ball out of bounds -- looked as good as any Kruger has put on the floor recently, he was non-committal about what he planned to do when Beck and Blassingame got over their "injuries" or whatever is bothering them.

Maybe he should just let them sit next to Leon for a while and see what happens.

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