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Shocked in San Diego: UNLV season ends with 42-21 loss
SDSU quarterback, turnovers sink Rebels, who finish one win shy of bowl eligibility
AP Photo/Denis Poroy
San Diego State running back Atiyyah Henderson, center, holds the ball out as he beats UNLV’s Terrance Lee (23) into the end zone on a 12-yard pass reception during the fourth quarter Saturday in San Diego. San Diego State won 42-21.
Sunday, Nov. 23, 2008 | 2:10 a.m.
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This season
- Week 1: Utah State, W 27-17
- Week 2: Utah, L 42-21
- Week 3: ASU, W 23-20 OT
- Week 4: ISU, W 34-31 OT
- Week 5: UNR, L 49-27
- Week 6: CSU, L 41-28
- Week 7: Bye
- Week 8: Air Force, L 29-28
- Week 9: BYU, L 42-35
- Week 10: TCU, L 44-14
- Week 11: New Mexico, W 27-20
- Week 12: Wyoming, W 22-14
SAN DIEGO -- What's on paper can't win ball games on its own.
San Diego State found 42 ways to prove that Saturday night at Qualcomm Stadium. The Aztecs looked nothing like the team that had stumbled to a 1-10 record going into the season's final weekend, one that dragged a porous defense with it like a ball and chain.
The Rebels, though, hardly resembled the team that had resuscitated a quickly fading season beginning two weeks ago, and suffered a loss that may be harder for the players and coaches to comprehend than any of the other six setbacks they'd accrued so far.
The 42-21 defeat on a cool, misty night in San Diego dropped UNLV to a 5-7 finishing mark for the 2008 season, one win shy of the bowl eligible status that seemed to be such a slam dunk way back when Mike Sanford's bunch opened the season 3-1.
Now, all of the scoreboard watching and 'who's bowl eligible, who's not' chatter that would have kept the Rebels busy for the next couple of weeks are nothing more than moot points.
"I don't think it was so much what we did, but what they did," said junior linebacker Jason Beauchamp, one of several Rebels who both entered and exited the locker room with stunned expressions and remains of tears on their faces. "They wanted to win this game more than we wanted to go to a bowl game."
What both teams did, in fact, was pretty uncharacteristic.
UNLV turned the ball over three times after having not done so since early in a victory over New Mexico two weeks ago. The Rebels had only given possession away 10 times all year coming into Saturday.
On the flip side, San Diego went the entire night without a turnover. That was something the Aztecs had not done all season.
With senior tailback Frank Summers leaving the game after the first series with a right knee injury, the Rebels finished the game with 33 yards on 20 carries against a run defense that ranked dead last in the nation coming in against the ground game, surrendering 267 yards on average. In fact, the fewest rushing yards the Aztecs had allowed this season before coming in were the 105 that Notre Dame piled up on Sept. 6.
Establishing the run game might have gone on the backburner in the second quarter, at which point UNLV began playing from behind. It would be that way the rest of the night.
The turning point of the night came late in the third quarter with San Diego State still clinging to a 14-7 lead it had taken into the halftime locker room. The Rebels faced a second-and-one from their own 41-yard line, and freshman quarterback Mike Clausen rolled out to the left. He lofted a pass deep toward the right sideline for frosh speedster Michael Johnson, who had a lead on an Aztec defender. The ball fell to the ground out of Johnson's hands. He may have scored on the play, and at the very least would have set the Rebels up in the SDSU red zone with a reception and a golden opportunity to knot up the score.
A play later, C.J. Cox fumbled the ball away -- UNLV's first turnover of the night -- and not too long after that, Darren Mougey's 3-yard run put the Rebels in a two-touchdown hole out of which they could not climb.
"You've got seven points right there or you're in the red zone, either or," Clausen said. "So you want to make that catch, but we had other opportunities, also. We didn't step up and make the plays we had to tonight, so that's how it went down."
The final nail came with UNLV still trailing by two touchdowns -- this time at 35-21 -- late in the fourth quarter. A Clausen pass over the middle sailed a bit and was picked by Corey Boudreaux. He shot through a sea of bodies into the clear, and 82 yards later, sealed the Rebels' 5-7 fate.
"There was a point there where I really believed -- until the interception for a touchdown -- we were gonna come back and win the game," Sanford said.
Instead, San Diego State quarterback Ryan Lindley ended the game in a fashion he was far from used to: He took a knee to drain out the clock in front of a handful of Aztec fans who had not yet given up on the team. The freshman gunslinger obliterated the UNLV secondary to the tune of 387 yards on 35-of-50 passing.
Now, the Rebels, who bid farewell for good to their seniors, are left to spend the offseason with mixed emotions. While there's plenty of optimism for next season, given the amount of playmakers who will be back for the Rebels off a team that more than doubled its win total from each of the previous four seasons, there are also lots of questions.
What will Mike Sanford's long-term future be beyond 2009? Can the influx of junior college defensive backs shore things up in the secondary? How will the run game look and can Sanford and his staff replace the thunder to go alongside the lightning they have in C.J. Cox? Can Omar Clayton produce at the same clip and be as efficient as he was through nine-and-a-half games this season?
The departing seniors now know one thing they'd like to see rectified.
"I'll feel better next year if the Rebels don't let this happen again," said Summers, who only got to carry the ball two times for 6 yards in his final game at UNLV. "Hopefully they'll be bowl eligible before this game, and if so, then I'll be happy."
Discussion: 12 comments so far…
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please don't waste any more time on the football team -- they are not news worthy.
Fire Sanford immediatly
"I think we went flat in certain parts of the game and that kind of hurt us." - Mike Sanford
How do you allow your team to play "flat" in the biggest game of your career, and the biggest game for the program in 5 years (in front of an empty stadium)?
How do you lose the rivalry game (again) at home by allowing a mediocre QB to single-handedly beat you?
5 wins is an improvement, but that is hardly silver lining.
still no interview with hambrick? would be nice to hear what he has to say. sandford is a clown, we all know he needs to go. if its a $$ thing, there has to be some incentive laden contract that someone could cook up like other schools do. bad deal.
The economy is bad right now. Good luck buying out the coach when nobody wants to spend money. Who will they bring in right now honestly? Who would change this program?
As most of you know williamtoomanybeers is a misguided reno cult follower and even though Sanford is 0-4 against reno, he wants him fired. You're a genius.
Thank you ryphi, finally someone with some sense. If our defense was at 10% of a real college football defense, we would have won several more games. Let's pray Sanford does something about it. You can blame players only so much, it's obvious that the scheme and subsequent changes (or lack thereof) for the SDSU game by the coaches was very poor.
I think a lot of people are jumping the gun a bit. I know it's easy to get down on Sanford at the moment, but lets wait it out and see what he does next year. The Rebels again have seven home games, plus most of the key pieces off of this team back. They're also bringing in some juco DBs to shore things up, which shows you that they've identified the problem and are trying to fix it. If they go 5-7 next year? Well, then ... yeah.
Which, in my opinion, is a very real possibility (of going 5-7 again).
There were weapons on this squad that weren't utilized correctly and poor game planning which led to stinging losses against Reno, CSU, AFA & BYU.
I believe the coaching staff could have won with the players they had in place. I won't necessarily buy into the new talent theory because of the past presence of guys like Mil'Von James, Eric Wright and Rocky Hinds.
I really think the common denominator here is coaching.
i agree grayback, way too much talent has come and gone through vegas for us to have 10 wins in FOUR years... we can have all the juco transfers in the world and that wont fix our coaching problems. run when we should pass, pass when we should run. confused on defense, penalties all over the place, lost on special teams. I'm not asking for perfection here, i just want some effort and consistency. hard to get the picture of frank summers sitting alone on the bench at the end of thst sd state game... he deserves way better.
I thought this was supposed to be a newspaper site, not a fan site. "I know it's easy to get down on Sanford at the moment, but lets wait it out and see what he does next year." WTF???? Are you kidding me?
I've been hearing the "see what he does next year" for three years. This year all his players were ones he recruited, so he has no excuse. But, like someone else said, theres no money to buy him out, so we're stuck with him for one more year.
"I've been hearing the "see what he does next year" for three years."
Building UNLV into a viable program is a seven year project... minimum. Doesn't matter WHO you get in here. Seems like UNLV hires 'em and fires 'em about every four years since the '70's (except for Robinson, who should have retired instead of taking on the UNLV job).
I don't know how on earth anyone can judge a coach until he gets a full roster of his own recruits (unless he's lucky enough to inherit a loaded team... not the case when Sanford arrived). It takes at least six seasons for a coach to get a full team of his own developed players.
UNLV has a big-time talent in Sanford. In reading these boards it's nice to see the "sharper knives in the drawer" are aware that continuous four-year-and-out coaching stints are killing the UNLV football program, not helping it.
Case Study... Brady Hoke, Head Coach at 12-0 Ball State...
Hoke had FOUR losing seasons at Ball State before going 7-6 in his fifth season. He is, of course, undefeated in this his sixth season (and Ball State is expecting its best recruiting year in the history of the program... they are ON THE MAP!).
Hoke went 5-7 in his fourth year as head coach... imagine that.