Josh Pastner gets NFR education — UNLV basketball hits road again

Josh Pastner didn’t fully grasp the enormity of the National Finals Rodeo when first being named coach of the UNLV men’s basketball team.

He couldn’t believe how long his team would be out of the Thomas & Mack Center.

That it needed more home games in December.

In all, the Rebels will have played only four games during the month and have a 30-day span between them at home. They return to the Thomas & Mack on Dec. 20 when UNLV opens Mountain West play against Fresno State.

“I didn’t understand why we just couldn’t put the rodeo on in (The Pavilion) with us playing in the Thomas & Mack,” Pastner said. “I kept getting told, ‘It’s not happening and won’t ever happen.’ You could win three straight national championships and it’s not changing.

“But now I understand. I’ve seen the foot traffic that comes through Thomas & Mack. There’s a lot of people. I understand the importance for the city and Thomas & Mack and for the economy.”

So his team will play away from home again Saturday.

Just not that far away.

Home away from home

The Rebels (4-5) meet Tennessee State (5-4) as part of the Jack Jones Classic at 6:30 p.m. at Lee’s Family Forum in Henderson.

UNLV is coming off a 75-74 win at Stanford in which the Rebels began looking more and more like the team Pastner envisioned in the offseason.

In the victory, 7-foot center Emmanuel Stephen made his UNLV debut after returning from injury. He offered a double-double of 18 points and 10 rebounds.

It’s the sort of size UNLV has lacked and needed to begin the season. The sort of inside presence that goes a long way between merely competing and winning games.

UNLV went 0-3 at the Players Era tournament, partly because it might have been the smallest team in the event. Now, with a player like Stephen returning to a lineup still beset by injuries at key positions like point guard, that won’t always be the case.

“Emmanuel is an energy giver,” Pastner said. “I’m a big believer in energy – that fight, that intensity, that urgency while playing with your hair on fire and that a possession is more important than breathing.

“Emmanuel has an understanding of that. We have great alignment on that. That’s important. It’s a contagious thing.”

Crazy. UNLV’s best two outings have been true road victories against Memphis and Stanford. Underdogs in both, the Rebels instead rose to the occasion despite their injury issues.

UNLV was coming off losses in both games.

Build a program

“It’s a testament to our young men and their character to be able to go on the road and win on the road after being punished and against the ropes,” Pastner said. “We were getting counted out in a way. I’ve tried to remind everyone that in Year 1, there are going to be ups and downs. You’re trying to build something, to establish culture, establish how you want to play.

“My whole thing is, you don’t want a team that is good one year and then down for two years and then up for a year. The goal is to have a really good program. With the climate we’re in, guys are going to go in and out because of the transfer portal. So the program has to be a at a highest level based on culture, based on ‘This is how we do things.’”

Pastner said the Stanford game was won at the defensive end and pointed out the play of guard Dra Gibbs-Lawhorn as the catalyst. He challenged Gibbs-Lawhorn to lead the way at that end and the junior transfer from Illinois responded.

The Rebels are still missing point guard Myles Che because of injury.

“No excuses,” Pastner said. “I have complete belief in our vision and clarity of how we want to get there. We just have to keep getting better every day.”

Contact Ed Graney at egraney@reviewjournal.com. Follow @edgraney on X.