Ron Kantowski on why breaking the NCAA Tournament into small pieces just might be the key to success for UNLV

By Ron Kantowski

Thursday, March 20, 2008 | 2 a.m.

The other day I heard Tennessee coach Bruce Pearl say on TV that his Volunteers are approaching the first and second rounds of the NCAA East Regional as if they are a mini eight-team tournament. He said the goal was to win that and then move on to the next minitournament, and so forth.

He wasn’t shirtless and he wasn’t wearing body paint, so you could tell he was being serious.

I think what Pearl was getting at is to be successful in the NCAA Tournament, you must try to turn a big stage into a smaller stage.

Maybe this is the mind-set the Rebels, who will play Kent State of the Mid-American Conference at 11:55 a.m. today in a first-round Midwest Regional game here, should adopt. Forget Clark Kellogg and Billy Packer and Seth Davis, whoever the heck he is. Instead, turn the Big Dance into a sock hop. Rather than Fred Astaire, make it the Backstreet Boys. Then perhaps the assignment wouldn’t seem quite so daunting.

Kansas, Portland State, Kent State, UNLV, Southern Cal, Kansas State, Wisconsin, Cal State Fullerton. Those are the eight teams that have assembled in the shadow of the old Omaha stockyards. The Rebels could just envision it’s the Maui Invitational, only substitute the Union Pacific railroad yard and 50-degree temperatures for palm trees and ocean breezes. And they might as well pretend USC, K-State, Wisconsin and Fullerton are off playing on the Big Island or something, because the convoluted way the bracket is set up means the earliest UNLV could play any of those teams is in the Midwest Regional final in Detroit on March 30.

Turn a big stage into a smaller stage. Maybe this is why BYU was successful in that Thanksgiving tournament at the Orleans this year. It was the Cougars and Louisville and Old Dominion and North Carolina — the best team in the land, then and now. BYU beat Louisville. It did not beat North Carolina, but was in the game until the final TV timeout.

Kent State is pretty good, but it got killed by North Carolina. Kent’s biggest win came over Saint Mary’s, knocking the Gaels out of the Top 25 in one of those BracketBuster games on ESPN. Teams from the MAC traditionally have been known to sneak up on teams from outside the MAC quicker than you can say Wally Szczerbiak. Or type it. But Kent doesn’t have a starter taller than 6-7. So for perhaps the first time since the Rebels played Kennesaw State a couple of days after Christmas, they will match up well.

Even though the No. 9 seed, which is what Kent State is, has beaten the No. 8 seed, which is what the Rebels are, 58 percent of the time since the NCAA adopted the 64-team bracket in 1985, this is one of those 42 percent where history may not repeat itself. The Rebels can win this game.

Then it would be Kansas (unless the pigs I smelled on the ride in from the airport begin to fly, in which case it would be Portland State) on Saturday, and although nobody says they’re looking past Kent State, let’s be honest, everybody is. Or at least has. As soon as they slid “UNLV” under “Kansas” on the CBS big board Sunday, that cute little blue and red bird with the bright yellow beak has been looming like a pterodactyl in the minds of Rebels fans.

And in the minds of Rebels players such as point guard Curtis Terry. “You’re gonna have to play ’em sooner or later, anyway, if you’re gonna advance in the tournament. But if you play them for the national championship or in the national semifinals rather than in the second round, they’re gonna probably be more focused. So get ’em early, and hopefully you’ll get a chance to beat ’em.”

Turn a big stage into a smaller stage. Envision the Qwest Center is the Orleans Arena. Pretend Brendan’s Irish Pub is just down the hall. That’s what Terry is saying.

But is that really possible?

Hard to say, although Terry used the term “bright lights” three times at the news conference Wednesday.

“We’re fortunate that eight of the 10 guys on the team this year were on the team last year,” he said. “Kendall (Wallace) and Mareceo (Rutledge) were the only ones that didn’t experience the NCAA Tournament. From that factor, everybody else has been here and knows what we’re going through these past couple of days in preparation. But for those guys we told them — it’s going to hit you quick.

“It’s the media session right now. There’s going to be a lot more people than there normally is at a game. The atmosphere is different because it’s not just your game, it’s not a home game, it’s a neutral game. There’s six other teams in the building.”

Terry’s right. There may be six world-class steakhouses within a four-block radius of the Qwest Center. But there’s no Brendan’s Irish Pub down the hall.

“So you get a little nervousness, perhaps, early in the ballgame,” said UNLV coach Lon Kruger, who has been to the big stage with four schools — and, admittedly, still gets a little excited himself every time he earns his way back. “But you hope to get through that quickly and get on to doing the things you’ve done to get here.”

When you boil it all down, or at least charbroil it, which is the more appropriate term in this town, it’s still 40 minutes of basketball — just like at the Maui Invitational, just like at the Thanksgiving tournament at the Orleans — with one giant variable, Terry says.

“If you lose, you go home.”