Rebels hoping to honor Tarkanian with victory against Boise State

By Taylor Bern

Wednesday, Feb. 18, 2015 | 2 a.m.

Entering the final two and a half weeks of the season, UNLV finds itself in eighth place of a lukewarm Mountain West with the league’s top three teams in the standings all still coming to the Thomas & Mack Center. That starts tonight with third-place Boise State (18-7, 8-4) and, with their own conference title aspirations long gone, many would call it a chance for the Rebels to play spoiler.

UNLV coach Dave Rice is not one of those people.

“I don’t ever think of UNLV as being a spoiler,” Rice said. “… I reserve that for other programs.”

Whatever Rice wants to call it, UNLV (14-11, 5-7) could do serious damage to Boise State’s NCAA Tournament aspirations with a victory. The game, which will air on CBS Sports Network, tips at 8 p.m. with fans encouraged to wear black and get to their seats 15 minutes early for a tribute to late coach Jerry Tarkanian.

Towels featuring the Tark logo that UNLV is wearing on its jerseys will be handed out to everyone in attendance. There’s even more planned for the free public memorial service at 2 p.m. March 1 at the Mack, but for many this is going to be an emotional night that caps an emotional week since Tarkanian, 84, died.

“He left a legacy that’s bigger than us, bigger than Las Vegas,” said freshman guard Jordan Cornish, who was born four years after Tarkanian coached his last game at UNLV.

In the middle of all that, the Rebels are trying to win a game and salvage what they can from the remainder of this season. And they’ll do it while dressing only seven scholarship players and perhaps needing contributions from walk-ons Barry Cheaney and Charles Rushman.

The big injury was Rashad Vaughn, the team’s leading scorer, who was scheduled for surgery this morning after tearing the meniscus in his left knee in last week’s victory against Fresno State. In UNLV’s first game without Vaughn, a 76-75 loss at Air Force, freshman reserve Dantley Walker left the game in the second half after committing a blocking foul that left his nose bloodied and his knee sprained.

Both guys could end up being done for the season, but they’ll get no sympathy from a league where key absences have been the norm, not the exception. Take Boise State, for example.

Senior guard Anthony Drmic played only the first seven games before an ankle injury ended his season. It took the Broncos awhile, including an 0-3 start in league play, but the emergence of James Webb and the dominance of Player of the Year frontrunner Derrick Marks helped Boise State rattle off eight straight wins before a loss last weekend to Fresno State.

That setback isn’t great timing for UNLV since the Broncos now really can’t afford a loss, but no matter the circumstances it’s fair to expect a close game out of these teams. Only two of the last eight meetings were decided by more than five points, and one of those was UNLV’s nine-point overtime loss in Boise earlier this season.

That was the Broncos’ first Mountain West win and it included 28 points from Marks. Rice said the Rebels will mix up their man and zone defenses against the Broncos, and one important thing is to not get deflated no matter what Marks does.

“Marks is going to score points, but we just want to make it as hard as we possibly can,” Rice said.

Boise State reserves Mikey Thompson, a Canyon Springs High grad, and Montigo Alford have been suspended the last two games, but Rice said he’s preparing like they’ll play. If they don’t, the Broncos’ bench would be nearly as short as the Rebels.

The lights will go out twice, first in the Mack to honor Tark and then at 10:30 p.m. on the Strip for another Tark tribute, and in between UNLV will try to harvest the crowd’s emotions into something positive.

“We should have been playing with a lot of emotion from the get-go,” Cornish said.

It’s too late for the Rebels to fix the standings, but if they’re going to join the Tark tributes there’s nothing better than a victory. It would certainly spoil the Broncos’ night.

Taylor Bern can be reached at 948-7844 or [email protected]. Follow Taylor on Twitter at twitter.com/taylorbern.