Notebook: Kruger may soon seek more disciplined shot selection

By Ryan Greene

Friday, Dec. 4, 2009 | 2:30 a.m.

Still in the immediate glow of a grinder of a victory on Wednesday night at Arizona, UNLV coach Lon Kruger dove right into a couple of concerns lingering on the surface.

Not trying to rain on his players' parade in any way, the most notable topic was his club's 3-point shooting. It's been far from stellar this season, and in the squad's first road test, it was downright ugly.

Sure, Derrick Jasper hit the game's biggest shot, cashing a trey late in the second overtime which proved to be the capper in a 74-72 victory for No. 24 UNLV.

But makes from deep have been inconsistent, and if it doesn't change soon, Kruger said he will intervene.

"A couple more games," Kruger said of his "deadline" following the team's Thursday practice at Cox Pavilion. "I told them last night, if you want to shoot them, you better start making them. The objective's not to shoot them; the objective's to make them."

UNLV got some quality looks on Wednesday from beyond the arc. Well, the Rebels actually got a lot of them. But whether the misses were bad or attempts which just rimmed out, the 5-of-26 results were unsightly.

Through six games, the Rebels are shooting 25.2 percent from 3-point range, hitting only 31 of 123 attempts. It ranks near the bottom of the barrel in the Division-I ranks. One bright spot on the horizon is that UNLV's next two opponents — Santa Clara on Saturday and Kansas State on Dec. 12 at the Orleans Arena — are among the nation's weakest squads in 3-point field goal defense.

As far as single-game percentages go, the 19.2 UNLV posted on Wednesday was a season low, barely edging a 20 percent showing against Holy Cross and a 22.7 against Louisville.

"It's kind of interesting where we are, record-wise, shooting 25 percent from three, and we're shooting quite a few threes," Kruger said. "We were talking to the guys afterwards, saying, 'Hey, we've got a couple more games, and either we start making threes, or we're shooting fewer.'"

A shift in gears on offense would play toward what has been a strength for UNLV this season during its 6-0 start — shooting inside of the arc.

Despite shooting 39.7 percent for the night on Wednesday, the Rebels hit 52.4 percent of their shots from two-point range.

For the season, they're shooting 56.3 percent in that department.

Junior Kendall Wallace, who was 1-of-4 from distance on Wednesday night, is the only Rebel shooting better than 40 percent from outside, having hit nine of his 21 attempts.

After that, freshman Justin Hawkins is 4-of-10, while Derrick Jasper is 3-of-9.

On the other end of the spectrum, Oscar Bellfield is 5-of-23 and Tre'Von Willis is 4-of-20.

"Some of the threes, you want plays in rhythm, you want plays that happen," Kruger said. "You can't force the issue, but you want the right guys shooting threes. Right now, we only have a couple, three of them with a chance to make many, so we have to start making more."

A testament to depth

Eight different Rebels played at least 14 minutes on Wednesday in what the team dubbed as a true team effort.

UNLV truly flexed its strength in numbers while clawing its way to a gritty win.

One prime example was starting forward Chace Stanback spending much of the stretch run in regulation and all of both overtimes on the bench after contributing 23 key minutes early on, with nine points, three rebounds and three steals. He came into the game averaging 21 minutes per outing.

During that stretch, senior forward Darris Santee produced much of his nine points and six rebounds before fouling out. Wallace contributed major hustle plays under the boards and was a menace on defense during his season-high 26 minutes.

"It was very important," Stanback said. "In the end, we just kept going to the people that were scoring. They got the job done, came away with the win for us."

Added Jasper: "Everyone played real well; everyone played real unselfish, and that's the key to our success this year. We're gonna win a lot of games like that."

What's made it possible early on is a lack of ego.

"That's not always an easy thing, but we have guys who are really unselfish," Jasper added. "Everyone's glued into a team atmosphere first."

Talk of the town

A local marketing group was part of a larger-than-normal crowd which showed up to see the Rebels practice on Thursday afternoon in preparation for Saturday's trip to face Santa Clara at 7 p.m.

The buzz created by the Rebels' resounding back-to-back victories over Louisville and Arizona wasn't just felt by the team in the gym.

Freshman guard Anthony Marshall said that once he logged on to his Facebook page upon returning to town late Wednesday night, he was swarmed with messages left for him and friends online looking to chat about the excitement.

He noted that at about 12:30 a.m. he had to force himself to shut the computer in need of sleep.

Not a bad problem to have.

"I've been getting text messages, e-mails, people writing me on Facebook. It's a buzz," he said. "That's credited to the hard work we've been putting in."

Getting the kinks out of the way

Neither Marshall nor fellow freshman Justin Hawkins made huge statistical dents on Wednesday night, and it was the first time playing single-digit minutes this season for both, but the experience from their combined 17 minutes in a raucous environment could prove quite valuable down the road.

"It's a big difference coming from high school, were you're a leader and have to do so much," Marshall said. "You're used to being out there, playing the whole game.

"Right when I got on the floor, I was playing point guard. Right away, the ball got in my hands. It was an intense environment. At the beginning, if I wasn't playing the point, I would have been playing real fast."