LAS VEGAS -- Rick Majerus loves Las Vegas.
The Utah coach enjoys the glitter, the glamour, the shows, the gaming and, of course, the restaurants.He just doesn't like bringing his basketball team here.
The Ute players arrived in town Friday afternoon, a day later than the coaches and a day later than they do for most road trips. They're staying in a hotel without a casino a mile off The Strip. It's safe to say, the Utes won't be seeing any "action" other than on the basketball floor this weekend
The 19th-ranked Utes (17-3, 6-0) will face one of their tougher road tests of the season tonight (8:30 p.m. MST, KJZZ-TV) when they take on UNLV at the Thomas and Mack Center. The Rebels are in second place in the MWC at 4-2 and are 13-5 overall. Ute fans may recall their team's last game here in March of 1998 when UNLV upset Utah in the first round of the WAC tournament, 54-51.
The Rebels are led by a couple of foreign players, center Kaspars Kambala and point guard Mark Dickel.
Kambala is a 6-foot-9, 250-pound center from Latvia, who has been in the top two in the Mountain West in scoring (18.7 ppg) and rebounding (8.9 rpg) all season and has garnered MWC Player of the Week honors three times already.
Dickel is a 6-2, 175-pounder from New Zealand, who is second in the nation in assists (8.9 per game) and also scores 14.2 points per game.
Majerus is well aware of the Rebels' top two players.
"UNLV has one of the top scorers in the league in Kambala and a terrific point guard in Dickel," said Majerus. "I have the utmost respect for Kambala. Dickel is the type of point guard that I've looked for and have enjoyed coaching because he's so unselfish and such a high-energy player."
Other starters for UNLV are JC transfer Trevor Diggs, a 6-3 guard, freshman Dalron Johnson, a 6-9 forward, and Donovan Stewart, a 6-4 junior. Danny Brotherson, a 6-4 forward, who played for Utah Valley JC last year, is the top player off the bench.
Diggs is seventh in the MWC in scoring at 15.7 per game, but he's in the middle of a terrible shooting slump right now. Since scoring 28 points on 11-of -17 shooting in a 25-point win over Air Force, Diggs has shot an anemic 12-of-54, including 1-of-12 at Wyoming and 1-of -13 at New Mexico. For the year he has hit just 32 percent of his shots.
The Rebels have been very inconsistent this season as shown by last week's results. They went to Fort Collins and picked up a key 78-75 road win and followed it two nights later with an embarrassing 109-98 loss to Wyoming in a game in which they trailed by 30 points in the second half.
Earlier this year they suffered big losses to No. 1-ranked Cincinnati (by 40 points), to North Carolina (by 24), and to Oklahoma State (by 14). They also lost their opening MWC game to BYU by two points in a game coach Billy Bayno had to sit out because of one-game suspension for missing a preseason MWC coaches meeting. They've also beaten Georgetown by 16, Princeton by 10 and New Mexico by 12 on the road.
The Utes are hoping they'll be healthier than last weekend when Jeremy Killion had to sit out most of the Air Force game with a shoulder injury and Hanno Motolla was hampered by injuries to his left elbow and right thumb. Those two should start along with Alex Jensen, Nate Althoff and Gary Colbert.
Next week the Utes play a pair of home games, Thursday night against San Diego State and Saturday night against BYU. At halftime of the Thursday game, Andre Miller's number will be retired in a special ceremony.