Columnist Ron Kantowski: Losing skid in Salt Lake is overblown

Tuesday, Jan. 11, 2005 | 9:20 a.m.

Ron Kantowski is a Las Vegas Sun sports writer. Reach him at ron@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4088.

Nobody should have been surprised that Utah routed UNLV in Monday night's Mountain West season opener for both teams in Salt Lake City, but not because the Rebels hadn't won there since 1982, which everybody keeps making a big deal about.

For starters, many of the players in that game are grandparents by now. I don't understand how a game they played more than 20 years ago has any bearing on one between their alma maters today.

And while the Utes have enjoyed the upper hand in the series with a 16-13 all-time edge, it's not as if the teams have been playing two or three times a year, as they did last year, in the interim.

Utah and UNLV didn't start playing regularly until 1996, when the Rebels joined the old WAC.

I can guarantee that if the teams were playing regularly during the early 1990s that that irrelevant statistic about the Rebels not having won at Utah since 1982 would not apply.

Utah's Andrew Bogut is a great player and all that, but what's up with his hair? It looks like he and Jerry Lewis have the same barber.

The last time I saw that much oil in one place was when the Exxon Valdez ran aground in Prince William Sound.

Anybody who doesn't understand why college kids sometimes don't see eye-to-eye with their coaches should consider Utah point guard Marc Jackson's fate against the Rebels on Monday night.

Jackson was benched for violating coach Ray Giacoletti's rule of missing practice, which he did on Friday.

It wasn't like he was off screwing around with his buddies. Jackson skipped practice so he could be with his wife for the birth of their child.

So much for there being an exception to every rule.

With his starched collar and pressed suit, the Fresno coach certainly looked overdressed for Sunday's ABA minor league basketball game against the Las Vegas Rattlers at decrepit All-American Sport Park. But at the same time he looked vaguely familiar.

"And the Heat Wave are coached by Ron Brewer," said the public address announcer, who was wearing a football jersey.

Ah, that explains it. That would be the Ron Brewer who was a two-time All-American, one of Arkansas' famous "Triplets," as he and Sidney Moncrief and Marvin Delph were called during the late 1970s. Brewer would go on to a nine-year NBA career with the Trailblazers, Spurs, Cavaliers, Warriors, Nets and Bulls, averaging 11.9 points over 501 games.

Several savvy basketball fans that were part of the tiny crowd asked Brewer to pose for photographs after the game, a request to which he gratefully complied.

Brewer's son Ronnie, a 6-foot-7 sophomore guard, is the leading scorer for this year's Arkansas team.

Congratulations to the Wranglers for setting an Orleans Arena attendance record Saturday night by featuring a novel giveaway -- good hockey.

A crowd of 7,310 was on hand to watch Las Vegas beat the Peoria Rivermen 4-3, the Wranglers' fifth consecutive victory.

Actually, if they announced the record crowd as they do goals, Peoria would have been credited with an assist. The 150 fans who made the trip from Illinois with the Rivermen fan club pushed the Wranglers over the top of the previous attendance mark of 7,242, set against Idaho last March 20.

In that Kurt Warner is no longer doing soup commercials, the Arena Football League needed something to improve its street cred with the Man Show crowd that comprises its fan base. It may have found the perfect partner in Electronic Arts, which will produce a video game featuring the AFL and its teams in time for the 2006 season.

The contract is for four years, and part of the deal is for EA to share the start-up costs for arena league expansion teams during that period as well as promote the league through media and retail marketing.

"For our core fan, this is akin to a network television agreement," said AFL commissioner David Baker, adding that the league considers males 18-24 its primary audience.

Electronic Arts, noted for its line of sports games including the popular Madden football series based on the NFL, is considered the leader in its field.

No word yet on what the game will be called, other than "Haege 2006" is not among the finalists.

Like Wallyworld, the Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame is closed.

Changes within pro rodeo's heirarchy -- it was announced during last month's National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas that Troy Ellerman is taking over as PRCA commissioner for Steve Hatchell -- have resulted in a padlock being put on the rodeo shrine's door.

The Hall of Fame, which recently celebrated its 25th anniversary, ranks among Colorado Springs' top 15 tourist attractions, which sounds pretty impressive but probably isn't, in that Mountain West Conference headquarters and the boyhood home of Sun award-winning photographer R. Marsh Starks are Nos. 12 and 14 on the list.

Tax documents show the Hall lost nearly $250,000 last year, the primary reason it will be shut down, reorganized and, says Ellerman, re-opened as a profitable venture.

"I don't think the Hall is a reflection of our association," he told the Denver Post. "It's underwater. We're not."

It's supposed to be cloudy Wednesday with a chance of showers and a bit of nip in the air. So you had better check to make sure the prep basketball games in your neighborhood will go on as scheduled.

Those of us from places where the wind and snow blows so hard during January that even the Abominable Snowman's mom tells him to wear a scarf and galoshes to school had to chuckle when Friday's entire prep schedule was postponed because Summerlin was buried under a half-inch of snow.