December has arrived for Rebels, and so too should Dr. Menzies

TEMPE, Ariz. — Marvin Menzies earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from UCLA and a master’s in education from Cal State Sacramento. I’m not sure how many psychology classes he might have taken in order to fulfill college requirements, but any such knowledge would serve him well now.

The calendar flipped to December and with it has arrived a predicted reality for UNLV’s basketball team, where Menzies might not have a more significant stretch of games this season in which to guide and, yes, challenge his players.

As much above the shoulders as below them.

Arizona State likely won’t shoot the ball as well from deep all season as it did Saturday night at Wells Fargo Arena, tying a school record for 3-pointers in dismissing the Rebels 97-73 before an announced gathering of 7,707.

The Sun Devils made 18-of-36 3s and had 13 at halftime, when they led 51-32, and the only question that remained was how large their margin of victory would prove.

UNLV and all its new faces departed November with a 5-2 record, fairly consistent with what most believed the roster could produce. The loss to South Alabama wasn’t totally expected; the loss to Texas Christian was.

But over the next four weeks, the Rebels will face a slate that includes games against three ranked teams (Duke, Oregon and Kansas) in a 12-day period and tougher-than-some-might-think contests against Incarnate Word and Southern Illinois.

It culminates with a Mountain West opener at Colorado State on Dec. 28 and a home game against Wyoming on New Year’s Eve.

“You have to look in the mirror as players and see what they’re made of a little bit,” Menzies said. “I was probably a little tougher on them than I needed to be in the locker room afterward, but they needed to hear it. It’s gut-check time. They need to understand what it takes to be good and how much the investment requires for you to be a really disciplined player for 40 minutes.

“It takes a lot of hard work. It’s one game. Arizona State shot the lights out. Rome wasn’t built in a day. We’ll get there. I still think we have a lot of talent, and they have to believe they can play better basketball than they are right now.”

It’s a banged-up Rebels team that is nursing both injuries and illness to key players, which hasn’t allowed UNLV to do as much live 5-on-5 work in practice recently, which is never a good thing for a group trying to discover chemistry within the framework of things.

UNLV will take Sunday off before beginning preparations for its next game.

Saturday.

T-Mobile Arena.

Duke.

It will be interesting to watch how Menzies approaches his team if some December results prove as lopsided as you would think, but if Saturday was any indication, he won’t for a second allow the Rebels to accept any level of defeat.

They said all the right things after the loss, upset they allowed the Sun Devils to get and stay so hot over the first 20 minutes, unhappy they didn’t do a better job in the second half when switching every screen and pressuring out front and still getting beat off the dribble for scores.

“We looked defeated at times when they were making all those 3-pointers,” UNLV senior forward Tyrell Green said. “We know we’re better than this. Everyone needs to hold this in their heads and use it as motivation. This next week at practice, we have to be locked in and at our best. We can’t dwell on this. It’s over. Stay confident, stay together.”

A year or two from now, if Menzies is able to build UNLV’s roster with more talent through recruiting and the Rebels face a non-conference schedule as a way to position themselves for an NCAA Tournament at-large berth, such a loss as the one Saturday would be, in the head coach’s words, a travesty.

But that’s not UNLV right now. Far, far from it. So in the reality of today, Menzies has to reach beyond Xs and Os, gauging the temperament of so many players who have never competed at this level, pushing those who are mentally tough and perhaps shepherding more those who struggle with results such as 97-73.

”It was a bad loss in the sense of the score,” Menzies said. “It’s losing to a Pac-12 team on the road. It is what it is. Let’s get better. That message will never change. We talked about a having big game (against Duke) in front of us. How do you keep them believing? How do you keep them understanding that this is a full season we have to go through? The state of the union is different right now, so you have to approach it differently.”

More than ever the next month, he will be as much psychologist as coach.

Contact columnist Ed Graney at egraney@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4618. He can be a heard on “Seat and Ed” on Fox Sports 1340 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. Follow @edgraney on Twitter.