Sep 12, 2007, 14:49 GMT
Las Vegas, NV - Facing ranked opponents at home in back-to- back games for the first time in program history, the UNLV Rebels prepare for the arrival of 24th-ranked Hawaii this weekend at Sam Boyd Stadium.
After tripping up Utah State in the season opener the Rebels were pitted against nationally-ranked Wisconsin at home last Saturday and gave the Badgers a run for their money before bowing in a 20-13 decision. UNLV is in the middle of three straight in Sin City, with next week's battle against Utah kicking off the squad's Mountain West Conference schedule.
As for the Warriors, a team that destroyed Northern Colorado in the opener by 57 points, they were nearly knocked out of the national poll on Saturday when they opened their Western Athletic Conference slate with a stop in Ruston, LA. Against Louisiana Tech, a team that fell to Hawaii by 44 points in Honolulu a year ago, the Warrior offense came out a bit flat and was forced to go to overtime before squeezing out a 45-44 victory on the mainland. The only team in the WAC to start a perfect 2-0 in 2007, Hawaii will have a chance to bolster its offensive stats next week when it hosts Charleston Southern in the South Pacific.
As far as the all-time series between these teams is concerned, Hawaii has won 11 of the 17 previous meetings, including a 42-13 thrashing in last year's contest. However, UNLV has taken three of the last four encounters, including the last two played in the desert.
Throwing for more than 400 yards for the eighth straight game and tying the NCAA record for consecutive games with at least 200 yards with 28 in a row, Colt Brennan nearly allowed everything slip away from him and the Warriors last week on the road before salvaging the one-point win. Brennan, who was named the WAC Offensive Player of the Week, set career highs with 43 completions, 61 pass attempts and 548 yards, finishing with four passing touchdowns and one rushing. While Brennan moved into fifth place on the NCAA's all-time passing touchdowns list with 101, he did so thanks to the efforts of Jason Rivers (176 yards), Ryan Grice-Mullen (162) and Davone Bess (118) who became the fourth threesome to record at least 100 yards receiving in a single game under head coach June Jones. After leading the nation in nearly every passing category a season ago, Brennan and the Warriors are up to their old tricks, producing a ridiculous 544 ypg through the air to place second in the nation in total offense with 585 ypg. However, with a mere 41 ypg on the ground the squad is back to relying on the shotgun far too much and not throwing different looks at defenses, something that will eventually come back to haunt them.
Expecting the offense to simply go off on the Bulldogs in Ruston, Hawaii actually trailed much of the contest and needed an extraordinary effort from the defense in overtime to preserve the narrow win. After the Warriors scored the first touchdown of the bonus session LaTech tried to put one in the win column, but Gerard Lewis made sure it wouldn't happen as he batted down a two- point conversion to give the visitors the come-from-behind triumph. Four players on the Hawaii roster were credited with double-digit tackles, beginning with Solomon Elimimian who had 14 stops, while Adam Leonard came up with 12 stops and one sack. Although he had just three total tackles, David Veikune got noticed with one sack of his own. Currently ranked third in the WAC, the pass defense for the Warriors is giving up just 159.5 ypg, but much of that has to do with the ineptness of Northern Colorado and is not a true reflection of some of the issues the unit has at the moment. Elimimian leads the squad with 19 total tackles and Brad Kalilimoku paces the group with 12 solo stops, but with just one interception (Keenan Jones) there is still a lot of improvement needed on the defensive side of the ball for the Warriors.
Scoring the only points of the first half on a touchdown pass from Travis Dixon to Casey Flair, the Rebels looked to be in a good position to treat the home town fans to an upset, but in the end the team could do no better than two more field goals in the seven-point setback to Wisconsin. In for Rocky Hinds who is out indefinitely with a knee injury, Dixon completed 23-of-36 for 258 yards, was picked off once and sacked two times in the losing effort. The real problem for the Rebels came in the running attack, one that produced a mere 48 yards on 27 attempts. Flair continued to impress as he caught 10 balls for a team-best 126 yards, but even that effort was not enough to hold off the Badgers. Considering the Rebels had to rethink their offensive attack so late in the summer, the team has not done that bad with Dixon as the field general. The signal-caller has completed 62.5 percent of his pass attempts and also leads the group with 134 yards rushing, but someone else is going to have to step up and take more of a leadership role if the squad is going to exceed last year's two-win total.
Wisconsin badgered the Rebels with 210 yards rushing on 41 attempts on Saturday, and still the home team managed to limit the visitors to only 5- of-15 on third down plays. Despite that feather in their cap, all those yards allowed Wisconsin to hold onto the ball when it counted the most, in the second half. Trying to give the defense a spark, Beau Bell bounced into action with a team-high 10 tackles and had the only sack of the game for the Rebels, but without a single forced turnover the hosts were fighting against the tide. Bell now has a team-high 19 tackles, of which 12 are solo, and also has two forced fumbles to his credit. Starr Fuimaono (13 tackles) is the only player with multiple TFLs, recording a pair for a loss of 11 yards. A season ago the Rebels had the worst scoring defense in the MWC, ranked 109th in the nation with 31.8 ppg surrendered, so at least there's been some improvement in that area thus far. In terms of total defense, the squad has also picked up the pace, currently fourth in the conference with 291 ypg allowed.
© 2007 The Sports Network
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