New Rebels had lesson to learn in Air Force game

You can simulate things in practice. You can talk until you’re blue in the face. Even Air Force blue. But trying to get a new group of basketball players to understand what it takes to compete against the Air Force Falcons is no easy task.

So UNLV coach Dave Rice knew he had a challenge on his hands. And half the battle was getting his first-year players to understand just what it was they had to deal with Saturday night at the Thomas & Mack Center. Fortunately for Rice and his staff, they had three days to prepare for the Falcons, who can kill you with 3-pointers or demoralize you with back-door layups.

“It’s always an eye-opener the first time you face Air Force as a player,” Rice said after his team had executed well enough to leave the Thomas & Mack Center with a 74-63 victory in front of 13,137. “But our guys did a good job of paying attention in practice and they were ready.

“We know teams are going to zone us so we work on our zone offense every day. I thought the more patient we got, the better our offense ran.”

Air Force indeed threw a 3-2 zone at the Rebels, daring them to knock down shots over the top. And early on, the shots weren’t falling. UNLV began the game just 2 of 7 from beyond the arc. But when Rice inserted senior Jelan Kendrick into the game six minutes into the content, things began to settle down for the Rebels. They started to make the extra pass. Or two. They started to find open people inside near the basket. And while Air Force never abandoned the scheme, UNLV had adjusted enough to be effective. The Rebels shot 46 percent from the floor, 38 percent from 3-point range and had 16 assists against just five turnovers.

If there was a downside to UNLV’s performance Saturday, it was on the boards. Despite having a considerable size disadvantage, Air Force managed to outrebound UNLV 32-29. But with both teams playing primarily zone defense and long rebounds off missed 3-pointers playing a factor, Rice will live with it for one night.

“We keep telling our guys the need for us to be able to rebound as a team,” he said. “When we were active in our zone, we were getting more rebounds.”

But given what you know Air Force is going to do, UNLV handled things fairly well. There was just one back-door layup, off a busted play in the second half by the Falcons and the Rebels answered that with a couple back-door buckets of their own.

“We preached talking care of the ball and being patient and we were able to do that for the most part,” Rice said of the win which improved UNLV to 4-5 in the Mountain West, 13-9 overall. “It was a good win for us against a very tough team to play against.”

Contact reporter Steve Carp at scarp@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2913. Follow him on Twitter: @stevecarprj.