Rebels good for openers

College football games last 60 minutes of regulation play.

UNLV might really have something if it were six.

It might not rank as the week’s biggest surprise in sports — Don Mattingly still has a job, after all — but the fact the Rebels don’t script their opening drive is fairly astonishing.

“We have an attack plan early and then plans for the first few third downs,” UNLV coach Bobby Hauck said. “That’s as far as we go on scripting.”

Given how things have played out, that’s unbelievable.

And, well, sort of an indictment.

Here’s why: The Rebels, who meet Fresno State at Sam Boyd Stadium at 7 tonight, have scored on their opening drive in five of six games.

In fact, 24 percent of the team’s points this season have been produced the first time UNLV possesses the ball in a given week.

It goes to reason that perhaps over several days of breaking down an opponent’s defensive film, of scheming and planning and dissecting every possible formation and call, UNLV coaches have managed to design a set of plays that will lead to a quick score and force the other guys to adjust.

But the Rebels are also 1-5 and have been outscored 232-101, so I’m not sure how much reason we’re going to find behind the scarlet-and-gray curtain.

“We’re coming out of the locker room ready to play and all juiced up,” Hauck said. “We go out and execute on opening drives and then, for whatever reason, go into a shell.

“That’s what is most frustrating. We’re just not making the same sorts of plays throughout the game that we do early on. Everyone involved is trying. But we need to coach better and play better and put it all together.”

It’s not good right now.

Nothing is good.

The Rebels haven’t been in a game during the fourth quarter since Sept. 13 against Northern Illinois. They were 10-point underdogs to a bad San Jose State side last week and lost by 23.

They are 10½ point underdogs to a Fresno State team tonight that, while winners of three straight, isn’t near the dominant side that lost just once in the Mountain West last season and beat Utah State in the league championship game.

The Bulldogs, like most in this conference, are all kinds of average. They rank 111th nationally in scoring defense and have been a perfect portrait of most Mountain West teams this year, which is to say they were absolutely boat-raced by non-conference opponents from major conferences and are just now finding success against flawed teams from an extremely flawed league.

But the Rebels have performed so poorly, appearing so inept following the initial drive, those wagering have to approach UNLV games as this: Bet the other side, no matter the spread, or run from it like one would a burning house.

UNLV’s offense has opened its last five games this way: Touchdown, field goal, touchdown, field goal, touchdown.

All positive results.

All momentum-building drives.

Then, not much of anything.

From the second quarter on, UNLV has been outscored 201-65.

Hauck said San Jose State didn’t adjust defensively after his team went 60 yards in 11 plays last week to take a 7-0 lead. If true, and I doubt it is, that’s even a worse omen for the Rebels and calls into question what in the world, if anything, their offensive coaches are doing most games.

It’s true that injuries have slowed the Rebels. You can’t take one of the league’s best wide receivers (Devante Davis, wrist) out of the lineup for weeks and not have your attack compromised.

But that’s not the only reason UNLV ranks 120th nationally in scoring. It’s not coaching very well and not executing much and, which tends to happen when things go this wrong, trying too hard.

“There has been some of that, where guys are doing too much to try and make a play instead of just executing their assignment,” Hauck said. “We have addressed it. We’re pressing, but that’s what happens when something is important to you. I’d never fault anybody for playing too hard, but you can see we’re frustrated.”

They should be. This is the fifth year of Hauck’s tenure and UNLV is getting routed up and down the field by teams it should be even with (or even better than) in terms of talent.

Florida State and Auburn and Alabama sure aren’t lining up opposite the Rebels each week.

“That’s the thing,” Hauck said. “We felt we were close in terms of ability with Northern Illinois and right there with San Diego State and San Jose State. To not win any of those games is very frustrating. There have been times when we didn’t feel like we were on an even playing field with those folks, but we do now. We have to go out and get a win.”

An idea: Coach and play better than just one offensive series.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ed Graney can be reached at egraney@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4618. He can be heard from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday on “Gridlock,” ESPN 1100 and 98.9 FM. Follow him on Twitter: @edgraney.