Tuesday, March 1, 2005 | 9:29 a.m.
With a little more than 12 minutes to go in the second half of Monday night's game, the UNLV Rebels appeared to have the New Mexico Lobos exactly where they wanted them.
The Rebels (14-12, 6-7), who had come from behind in the second half to win five consecutive games, including their had-to-see-it-to-believe-it rally from a 10-point deficit in the final 20 seconds at San Diego State, trailed by nine points.
But this time there was not an 18-2 run to pull out a victory like the Rebels had done Saturday night against Air Force. There was no Odartey Blankson jumper in the final second to cap a five-point rally in the final two minutes like they had done at Wyoming. There was no rebounding from a 13-point deficit like at Colorado State.
Simply put, the tightrope finally snapped on Team Comeback, which dropped a 77-66 decision to the red-hot Lobos (22-6, 9-4) before a Senior Night crowd of 11,199 at the Thomas & Mack Center.
Not that UNLV didn't try to pull out another miracle at the end after trailing by as many as 17 points, 64-47, with 4:49 to go in the game.
The Rebels whittled the lead to seven points, 73-66, on a Michael Umeh jumper with 39.6 seconds remaining. But Lobos guard Mark Walters (14 points) and center David Chiotti (18 points) combined to make 10 consecutive free throws in the final 1:19 to dash UNLV's comeback hopes.
"Forty seconds to go, down seven, you still feel like there's a chance," UNLV coach Lon Kruger said. "New Mexico did a good job of knocking free throws down at that point."
The Lobos, who clinched second place in the MWC with the victory and have now won eight of their past nine games, were knocking down more than free throws on Monday night, however.
New Mexico shot 57.8 percent from the floor for the game, including a sizzling 73.7 percent (14 of 19) after intermission. Senior forward Danny Granger finished with a game-high 22 points and grabbed eight rebounds while senior guard Troy DeVries connected on 6-of-8 3-pointers en route to 18 points.
"It's disappointing any time you lose," said Blankson, who finished with 20 points and eight rebounds. "New Mexico is a great team. They made a lot of plays tonight. We didn't play as well as we could have played."
"Obviously, it's a tough last one for the seniors," Kruger said. "I thought the seniors battled and scratched and have done a terrific job. And for them to lose that last one (at home) is disappointing."
UNLV (14-12, 6-7) locked up a spot in the 4-5 matchup in the first round of the Mountain West Conference tournament at the Pepsi Center in Denver next Thursday. The Rebels will face the loser of Saturday's game between Wyoming (15-11, 7-6) and Air Force (17-11, 8-5) at Clune Arena.
UNLV concludes it conference season at BYU (9-19, 3-10) on Saturday night.
"We're not going to hang our heads," Kruger said. "We've got to keep going. Obviously we feel bad about losing a ballgame. But we're not going to let this devastate the direction for which we're headed."
"This game is over with," Blankson added. "We face BYU next and we have to get ready to play again. ... We'll learn from this. We have to play better."
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