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What a year

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ButcherPete13

All Conference
Jan 10, 2016
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Title says it all. We definitely went through our ups and downs, and while this season didn't exactly go as planned, I can say I am very proud of the players and coaches. While they didn't meet our expectations, it was never for lack of effort. Just wanted to say thanks to all the players and coaches for giving it all they had, especially at the end of the year when things got tough.

I also want to thank Dave Rice for all his effort over the past 5 years. He never could get it together, but he truly bleeds rebel red, and wanted to UNLV to succeed more than any of us.

It was a year we will all try to forget, but definitely provided some great memories. My favorite part was going to Maui for the tournament and watching them beat Indiana. Such a crazy atmosphere I'll never forget. What are some of your guys favorite moments?
 
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ButcherPete13 said:
Title says it all. We definitely went through our ups and downs, and while this season didn't exactly go as planned, I can say I am very proud of the players and coaches. While they didn't meet our expectations, it was never for lack of effort. Just wanted to say thanks to all the players and coaches for giving it all they had, especially at the end of the year when things got tough.

I also want to thank Dave Rice for all his effort over the past 5 years. He never could get it together, but he truly bleeds rebel red, and wanted to UNLV to succeed more than any of us.

It was a year we will all try to forget, but definitely provided some great memories. My favorite part was going to Maui for the tournament and watching them beat Indiana. Such a crazy atmosphere I'll never forget. What are some of your guys favorite moments?
Click to expand...
- Indiana
- Oregon
- Pat's shot vs UNR
- DJ highlight reel
- crazy 3 OT game
 
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I've been a witness to some disappointing years. I've seen some Rebel teams exceed expectations, and I've seen them sadly fail to come close to expectations.

But I can truly say this Rebel team played as a team, played for each other and gave their full effort to the end. If the core group (McCaw, Cornish, Morgan, Poyser, Carter along with Opbeka and hopefully Jone) comes back next year, I think whoever takesover will have found themself in a pretty good situation.
 
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JTthe2nd said:
Derrick Jones. God I hope he comes back to play one more year. He's so fun to watch. He'll just be another dime a dozen freak athlete if he tries to go pro now.
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He is oozing potential and will eventually a stud someday, but I agree, he definitely needs at least 1 more year to hone his skills. But he did noticeably improve throughout the year.
 
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Indiana was a great game. Best game played by our guys all year. I really was feeling the excitement and started buying into the hype at that point. The we all knew what came next.

I was really low on Carter to start the season but he made me eat humble pie with his constant hustle and energy. Was very sad to see him go down.

Young team, and I hope they all return as well as the verbal commitments from incoming Freshmen. All eyes will be on the coaching search from fans to players. I hope they get it right this go-round.

As for player list, here's how next year looks:
Carter - SR
Cornish - JR
Green - SR (medical RS?)
Jones - SO
McCaw - JR (possible departure)
Morgan - JR
Obekpa - SR
Poyser - SO
Starr - SO (walk-on)
Zimmerman - SO (possible departure

Graduating:
Nwamu
Seagears
Cheaney
Glenn
Perez

Signed commits:
SG - Christian Vital
SF - Carlos Johnson

Verbal commits:
PG - Jaylen Fisher
SF - Jackson
 
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chitownrebel said:
It's hard to thank someone who set our program back 10 years....Hopefully the new coach can fix all of the issues created by Dave Rice
Click to expand...
Ton of hyperbole.

No, it didn't turn out the way anybody wanted. Not close. But if the program was "set back 10 years", the impressive list on interested candidates now would match the unimpressive list of interested candidates 10 years ago. UNLV won't be able to afford most and who can say who UNLV will ultimately get.

10 years ago, we couldn't recruit high profile players. Now we can. Oh, that did come with issues for sure and was probably a part of the problem (the entitlement syndrome and effect on overall chemistry). But it was abundantly proven that you could get NBA level and fringe NBA level talent to UNLV.

UNLV demonstrated that they could also beat national level teams with decent regularity. The flip side of the inconsistent nature showed that UNLV could drop lowly games, too. We can scoff at beating Indiana, Oregon, Arizona, UNC, etc, call them flukes if you want, but there were a few too many to call flukes.

Between the recruiting acumen and beating national teams, significant portions of the UNLV program were elevated on a national level, hence interest by a much higher candidate pool.

Anybody that paints the era as roses is blind. Anybody that calls it manure is just as blind.
 
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It certainly was a year of emotional ups and downs for me. I was ecstatic at the beginning of the year because of the potential this team had.

I was overly concerned about the Arizona St game and called it a must win as we were going into conference play. That game really seemed to me to be the personality and makeup of the team unfortunately. Then I called the Fresno St game to be a much more must win because dropping that game would be devastating for the confidence of the team and I was right.

But it's how the team rallied around each other over the next few months with all the adversity they faced was really impressive. And I think Simon and the other coaches did a great job keeping the ship from sinking. They remained competitive in almost every game they played from that point on.

Although this was a season to forget it's also a season I will always remember because this team played their hearts out.

Thank you to the entire team for your efforts.
 
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UNLVAlumni said:
It certainly was a year of emotional ups and downs for me. I was ecstatic at the beginning of the year because of the potential this team had.

I was overly concerned about the Arizona St game and called it a must win as we were going into conference play. That game really seemed to me to be the personality and makeup of the team unfortunately. Then I called the Fresno St game to be a much more must win because dropping that game would be devastating for the confidence of the team and I was right.

But it's how the team rallied around each other over the next few months with all the adversity they faced was really impressive. And I think Simon and the other coaches did a great job keeping the ship from sinking. They remained competitive in almost every game they played from that point on.

Although this was a season to forget it's also a season I will always remember because this team played their hearts out.

Thank you to the entire team for your efforts.
Click to expand...
It became a season that quickly unraveled.

After the 0-3 conference start, I still think this team could have had enough bounce back to make a far more significant run - because there was depth, there was talent and the league is bad.

Once Ben went down, I feel ALOT was gone. Not numbers, necessarily, though they were fine. Great presence, great leadership, did the blue collar stuff better than anyone on the team. It was a huge hit. Then, of course, Zimm misses significant time as does Dwayne, Jerome starting to play pretty well and then getting gimpy (still played pretty well through it).... It was kind of a landslide that nobody could stop. And then any minute chance at MWCT success quickly evaporated with the Derrick Jones drama.

To be honest, given all that transpired, I absolutely expected this team to completely fold. I've seen better teams in much better overall shape with much less adversity fold. This team really did fight to the end. I can live with that.
 
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Chitownrebel said:
It's hard to thank someone who set our program back 10 years....Hopefully the new coach can fix all of the issues created by Dave Rice
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Set the program back 10 years, really? WOW! If the majority of the players eligible to come back do, then Dave will have left the team with a lot more talent then Lon did. And Lon left us in pretty damn good shape.
 
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vegasmdr said:
Set the program back 10 years, really? WOW! If the majority of the players eligible to come back do, then Dave will have left the team with a lot more talent then Lon did. And Lon left us in pretty damn good shape.
Click to expand...
That's the other thing - what's left now is good; Zimm, Carter, Pat, Dwayne, Derrick, Jordan, Poyser, Vital, Carlos, Fisher, Justin Jackson, Obepka... I don't care how you slice it or dice it, it's an absolutely loaded roster in terms of talent and depth (yes, I know, much like this season). No, I have zero delusions that every one of them will make the decision to return, in fact, it may be pretty gutted. But what was left on the table at the time he was fired is very promising.
 
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j. spilotro said:
Ton of hyperbole.

No, it didn't turn out the way anybody wanted. Not close. But if the program was "set back 10 years", the impressive list on interested candidates now would match the unimpressive list of interested candidates 10 years ago. UNLV won't be able to afford most and who can say who UNLV will ultimately get.

10 years ago, we couldn't recruit high profile players. Now we can. Oh, that did come with issues for sure and was probably a part of the problem (the entitlement syndrome and effect on overall chemistry). But it was abundantly proven that you could get NBA level and fringe NBA level talent to UNLV.

UNLV demonstrated that they could also beat national level teams with decent regularity. The flip side of the inconsistent nature showed that UNLV could drop lowly games, too. We can scoff at beating Indiana, Oregon, Arizona, UNC, etc, call them flukes if you want, but there were a few too many to call flukes.

Between the recruiting acumen and beating national teams, significant portions of the UNLV program were elevated on a national level, hence interest by a much higher candidate pool.

Anybody that paints the era as roses is blind. Anybody that calls it manure is just as blind.
Click to expand...


The Mendenhall Center deserves credit for elevated recruiting since it was built for that very outcome: to elevate recruiting.

On paper Rice recruited well but he recruited guys who lost and lost a lot. He set school records for home losses. Recruits quit, transferred, or played poorly in bulk. The T&M has become empty because the program slid further down the conference ladder the longer Rice stayed.

There's 200 coaches who could have done more at UNLV the past 5 years than Rice did. Call me a Rice-hater or whatever but the guy was WAY in over his head and it was entirely recognizable midway through year 2 of his tenure and just got worse from that point. Super nice guy, very poor head coach.
 
DocRebel said:
The Mendenhall Center deserves credit for elevated recruiting since it was built for that very outcome: to elevate recruiting.

On paper Rice recruited well but he recruited guys who lost and lost a lot. He set school records for home losses. Recruits quit, transferred, or played poorly in bulk. The T&M has become empty because the program slid further down the conference ladder the longer Rice stayed.

There's 200 coaches who could have done more at UNLV the past 5 years than Rice did. Call me a Rice-hater or whatever but the guy was WAY in over his head and it was entirely recognizable midway through year 2 of his tenure and just got worse from that point. Super nice guy, very poor head coach.
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If Mendenhall was so strong, the primary reason, then why was it that Bayno, who had use of the North gym (not even the cox practice facility) far outrecruited the two coaches immediately after him.

If the Mendenhall is the magical magnet people proclaim, then what UNLV needs to do is spend 200k on an entire staff, all basketball minds only, guys that cannot and do not have to recruit... Because the Mendenhall, all by itself, will bring in talent.

People really don't understand that recruiting is about relationships???? Seriously??????

Whether you're a hater or not, I couldn't care less. But I would think you wouldn't hate a guy that honored a scholarship to people who couldn't start on the Basic High School JV team as a senior.
 
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j. spilotro said:
If Mendenhall was so strong, the primary reason, then why was it that Bayno, who had use of the North gym (not even the cox practice facility) far outrecruited the two coaches immediately after him.

If the Mendenhall is the magical magnet people proclaim, then what UNLV needs to do is spend 200k on an entire staff, all basketball minds only, guys that cannot and do not have to recruit... Because the Mendenhall, all by itself, will bring in talent.

People really don't understand that recruiting is about relationships???? Seriously??????

Whether you're a hater or not, I couldn't care less. But I would think you wouldn't hate a guy that honored a scholarship to people who couldn't start on the Basic High School JV team as a senior.
Click to expand...


Actually the Mendenhall Center has been a game-changer for UNLV basketball in multiple ways. I don't need to explain that. Bayno would have recruited better with the Mendenhall than he did with the north gym, and Spoon and Kruger both would have recruited substantially better than they did.

That point doesn't matter anyway because recruiting becomes moot when half the players bolt after a season while the other half dwells at the bottom of the MWC.

Haha you keep looking to divert it over to DW for some reason. I'll just say that if you want me to advocate again for DW to alleviate Doolin for 3 minutes a game then by all means start a thread on DW and I'll happily chime in.

Rice mismanaged every roster he had at UNLV. Maybe it's not as obvious for others to see that. I caught onto it 4 years ago and thankfully it's all over now.
 
It all comes down to wins and losses. The wins weren't there, we can give tons of reasons why they weren't. It is easy now.

In so many other ways we are fine. The program isn't in a shambles. It isn't like he left us on probation or something.

Another guy could come in here and succeed right away so that means we doing fine overall.
 
chitownrebel said:
It's hard to thank someone who set our program back 10 years....Hopefully the new coach can fix all of the issues created by Dave Rice
Click to expand...
this has to be one of the single worst posts in the history of internet posting.

"set our program back 10 years" WOW. Joe, still looking for that BOOOOO button. this is ridiculous.
 
You realize the Mendenhall didn't open until after Kruger left, right? But besides that, seeing that Kruger's recruits are producing Top 10 basketball I'd say "yes" Kruger has indeed been a great recruiter.
 
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I would agree that Kruger is not a great recruiter at all. Look at the classes at Oklahoma and you can see they run in the 65-80 ranges compared to other schools. What he does do well is pick out players that fit his system and coaches them up. Unfortunately he has had far better luck at Oklahoma then he ever had at UNLV.
 
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lvhiker said:
Joe, I think the expression "over exaggerate" is self-referential! I love it.
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Kinda like no matter what, if UNLV was "stupid" enough to hire Pitino, they'd automatically get in trouble with the NCAA?

I seriously hope you didn't teach youth to have such a closed mind when thinking about situations.
 
Its funny to watch both sides still go at it.... There were certain posters "i.e. mom" saying something along the lines of if UNLV fired Rice it would set the program back 10 years or the death of UNLV basketball it was something like that. I don't exactly remember but it was pretty drastic. Its pretty clear where most of the insiders/mods stand seeing as theres still that stupid Rice appreciation thread pinned at the top of the confidential board meanwhile we are trying to move on and hire a new coach.
 
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Player development is important and recruits see a facility like the Mendenhall Center and it does help with Recruiting for sure. If Kruger stayed I am pretty sure his level of recruiting would have picked up because of the facility. That's why he pushed to have it built.
 
manic water said:
Mendenhall or not, Kruger has never been a great recruiter.
Click to expand...

Buddy Hield is probably going to get the POY award. Kruger would have recruited just fine if the facilities were here while he was. As long as teams win, and consistently battle for an NCAA spot, recruits will come.
 
Of course the practice facility helped recruiting and Kruger would have had better results had he been here. He still wouldn't have had Rice like results.
 
On the topic of recruiting. I think some people view recruiting the wrong way. They look only at the number of stars attatched to a players name. If a school lands 3 top 100 players they did a great job 'recruiting'. That simply isn't always true in my opinion. There are four things I think fall into recruiting.

1) Talent evaluation. Not all four/five star recruits are created equal its impossible for Rivals and other sites to grade all of these recruits properly or accurately. Not being enamoured with stars and trusting your own evaluations not those of others is important.

2) Recruiting to your identity. If you are a determined to be a hard nosed aggressive defensive team, you have to recruit to that and only that. You can't recruit 4 dudes that sell out on the defensive end and another guy that gives zero effort. SDSU recruits to what they do regardless of stars.

3) Roster construction. You have to have the proper depth at all postions.

4 ) Player character. Maybe the most important of all. Are you recruiting players that take to coaching? Are you recruiting players that are team oriented. Are you recruiting players that buy into a system or willing to accept a role for the benefit of the team.

UNLV did a fantastic job collecting players with stars attatched to their names. This isn't knocking 4 or 5 star recruits or saying not to recruit them. Just recruit the right ones. Recruit kids that fit what you want to do.

Where UNLV failed was establishing an identity and sticking to it. You cant tell 6 kids on the team to sell out on defense but let AB and KR play like matadors. If we were hanging our hat on defense recuiting guys like AB and KR was a mistake. We may have been better served passing on AB and grabbing a lower rated kid who bought into the system. Sure in the short term it wouldn't cause a big splash but long term it may have been more beneficial to the program.

I think UNLV proved you could get highly rated players to come here. In that regard recruiting was a success. In nearly every other facet of recruiting they failed to some degree or another.

This isn't placing blame on the players. Dave had his faults for sure. But its hard to complete a puzzle if you don't have all of the pieces or the pieces belong on a different puzzle.
 
j. spilotro said:
Kinda like no matter what, if UNLV was "stupid" enough to hire Pitino, they'd automatically get in trouble with the NCAA?

I seriously hope you didn't teach youth to have such a closed mind when thinking about situations.
Click to expand...

Well, in my humble opinion, Pitino, because of the hooker-gate, is toxic. And because of the fact that Nevada and prostitution are connected in the minds of the public, his negative impact on the reputation of UNLV would far and away outweigh any positive impact because of the game of basketball.

This says nothing about what the NCAA would think about RP trying to get out from under whatever penalties will befall U of L because of Ricky's hanky-panky.

Of course none of this is relevant since there never was a chance that RP was coming to UNLV.

But I don't want to "over exaggerate" the negative consequences of a RP hire :)
 
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The funny thing about Rice and recruiting is that the biggest missing piece of the puzzle every year has been finding a top level point guard. He finally found a really good point guard (on paper) in Fisher who hopefully is still coming to UNLV next season. Whoever becomes the new coach will end up with a really good group of returning players (assumption that they stay) and the right recruits to make a complete team (assuming they still come). It would also be nice if the NCAA stop looking like big DICK's (persons name) and quit trying to prove some point with Jones who is a 3.25 gpa college student.
 
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