Tough road trip will decide Rebels’ place in MWC

Steve Guiremand

Friday, Jan. 28, 2005 | 10:27 a.m.

A sweep of the Front Range schools last weekend at the Thomas & Mack Center has brought the UNLV men's basketball team back to the .500 mark in Mountain West Conference play.

Now comes the tough part.

If the Rebels (9-7, 2-2) are to be more than pretenders in the final six weeks of the Mountain West race, they're going to need to come up with their share of road wins in a conference that historically has been very tough on visiting teams.

UNLV travels to New Mexico (14-5, 1-3) on Saturday night to play a Lobos squad that is 12-1 at The Pit this year. Two nights later the Rebels travel to Colorado Springs to play defending conference champion Air Force (12-7, 3-1), which owns the NCAA's second-longest home winning streak at 22 games, at Clune Arena.

"We kind of did last week what we had to do to hold our own," UNLV coach Lon Kruger said. "We won two games at home. Now we have to go on the road and pick it up another step and try to steal one or two games and keep making progress."

Especially if the Rebels, who lost their only other conference road game this season, 70-52, at Utah, are to have any shot at making a serious run at the Utes (17-3, 5-0) down the stretch.

In each of the past three seasons, the regular-season Mountain West champ has needed five road victories to capture the title. The two years prior to that, both Utah (1999-00, 2000-01) and BYU (2000-01) gained a share of the regular-season crown with just three road wins.

Visiting teams were a combined 13-43 (30.2 percent) a year ago and only one team, Air Force (5-2), had a winning road mark. The Rebels have had a winning road record just once in five years of MWC play. That was in 1999-2000, when they went 4-3 and tied Utah for the conference title with a 10-4 record.

Kruger said he understands if some UNLV fans are taking a wait-and-see approach on his team's recent comeback until they see if the Rebels can win some big league road games.

"I think that is fair given that we're 2-2," Kruger said. "If we don't win any on the road, then we're not going to be legitimately in the battle."

Although New Mexico has won 80 percent of its games (548-133) at home since 1966-67, UNLV is 6-6 there in its history and has won each of the last two years there.

With two key Lobo starters hobbled -- all-MWC forward Danny Granger (knee) and steady starting center David Chiotti (hip flexor) -- and starting point guard Kris Collins (broken right foot) likely out for the season, the Rebels appear to be playing New Mexico at exactly the right time.

"This is a game that is winnable," Rebels point guard Jerel Blassingame said. "They've got some guys with some injuries. It's a good opportunity for us to go in and steal one."

However, both Granger, who has missed the past three games since undergoing arthroscopic knee surgery on Jan. 10 for torn cartilage, and Chiotti, who left New Mexico's 68-53 loss at BYU in the first half with a sore hip on Monday, were upgraded to probable by the Lobos coaching staff after Thursday's practice.

"I'm pretty sure I'll play," Granger told the Albuquerque Journal. "I'm feeling good. I'm still a little hesitant with some things. ... But I'm dunking and everything. There's a little swelling in the knee, but that's normal. There's some pain, but it's not unbearable pain."

UNLV also got some good news on the injury front Thursday when Blassingame (sprained left ankle) practiced at nearly full speed.

"The pain is gone," Blassingame said. "It's just a little swollen still. After time it loosened up a little bit. I'll keep getting treatment and it will be fine."

"He looks fine," Kruger said. "He may not be quite 100 percent (Thursday) but by Saturday I would expect him to be."