Sanford shakes up lineup

Steve Guiremand

Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2005 | 10:55 a.m.

The fallout from Saturday night's error-plagued 22-14 loss to Nevada-Reno in the Battle for the Fremont Cannon hit the Lied Athletic Complex with a loud thud on Monday morning.

That was when UNLV head coach Mike Sanford revised his team's two-deep for this weekend's game at Utah State.

Three changes were made to the starting offensive unit with the biggest coming at wide receiver where true freshman Corey Anderson, who saw his first very brief action of the season in the loss to the Wolf Pack, as the starter over junior Donell Wheaton, who is tied for sixth in the Mountain West Conference in receptions and was one of the team's offensive stalwarts in the first two games against New Mexico and Idaho.

The other changes were on an offensive line that has yielded a conference-high eight sacks including four against Nevada.

Junior Aaron Mueller, the team's starter at right guard during the first three games of the season, has moved over to starting center to replace sophomore Tim Goins. Junior Marco Guerra, still slowed at times by the side effects of a broken leg suffered at Colorado State last November, takes over Mueller's starting right guard spot with Goins now the backup at both spots.

That's not all. Junior tailback Erick Jackson, who is eighth in the MWC in rushing with an average of 72.3 yards per game, is now listed as a co-starter with senior JaJa Riley, who has rushed for just 12 yards on nine carries this season (1.3 avg. per carry). And junior Chris Bowser, the team's starter at left tackle, is now listed as a co-No. 1 with junior Brandon Gray.

The offensive line moves weren't that unexpected because most of those moves had already happened after halftime in Reno. But the demotions of Wheaton and Jackson were eye-popping.

When asked why Wheaton, a member of the team's leadership committee, was demoted, Sanford refused to give a specific reason why.

"I'd like to keep that in-house," he said. "He just doesn't deserve to start. (It's) a combination of how he played and not doing what he's supposed to be doing as far as meeting times and so on and so forth.

"I'm sure it's tough for him. But there's a standard of excellence he needs to live up to, day-in and day-out, week-in and week-out, and he didn't do it this week. He didn't play the same in (the Nevada-Reno) game as he did in the first two games."

Wheaton had three catches for 17 yards and no touchdowns against the Wolf Pack. However, quarterback Shane Steichen twice overthrew him on open deep routes on the first UNLV series of the game.

"When people look at our passing statistics (a dismal 7 of 25 for 58 yards at Reno) the natural tendency is to say (it's) the quarterback," Sanford said. "But there is a lot more to it than that.

"We did not protect in the passing game like we should have. We didn't run routes in the passing game like we should have. And even if it's one guy, that one guy is huge in the play. At times it was Shane but it wasn't always Shane."

As for Jackson now sharing his starting spot with the seldom-used Riley, Sanford said he was impressed with the effort put forth by the senior transfer from Ohio State.

"Erick Jackson played hard," Sanford said. "But Erick Jackson made some mistakes he can't make in protection and in routes in some critical situations. And JaJa Riley played his heart out. He played really hard. He's a senior and he deserves to play. We're going to play both of those guys at tailback."

Sanford singled out Riley, tight end Greg Estandia and right tackle Jesse Knight, who played despite still suffering some effects of a stinger, for playing hard on offense in the game.

"Looking at the tape, a guy who played his heart out and had a great effort in general was Greg Estandia," Sanford said. "Outstanding. I mean every play he played hard."

Sanford was pleased with his team's overall defensive intensity and singled out the play of right safety Jay Staggs as well as nose guard Howie Fuimaono and defensive tackle Isaiah Tafua.

"I think our two tackles (Fuimaono and Tafua) are as good as anybody in the conference," Sanford said. "Our deal on defense is to get a knockback, knock the center and guards backward and create some problems in there. And they're doing it."

Sanford also evaluated senior Leon Moore, the conference leader in both sacks and tackles for loss, to a co-starter with Isaac Watts at left defensive end.

"Leon is playing better and better every week," Sanford said.

One thing is for certain. The Rebels can expect some tough, intense practices this week getting ready for their final non-conference game against Utah State.

"We're not going to make it enjoyable to lose around here," Sanford said. "It's going to be a miserable existence."

Sanford said UNLV has given Whitley, who also visited North Carolina out of Victor Valley Community College in Victorville, Calif., a release from his scholarship to that he can transfer to another school.

"I have no idea where he'll go," Sanford said. Whitley took part in spring drills but lost out the starting left corner spot to junior Ernest Gordon. He did not make the trip to Reno over the weekend.

"It's a combination of a lot of different things over a period of time," Sanford said when asked why Whitley had been dismissed from the squad. "The straw that broke the camel's back is there was an on-campus class incident. I won't go into detail on that but I thought he embarrassed the football team in a classroom situation. We're not going to allow that to happen on this team.

"He was late. He was rude. He was all of the above. And we're not going to allow that to happen."

Sophomore Solomon Smart is now listed as Gordon's backup as well as the backup to right cornerback John Guice.