Ron Kantowski is a Las Vegas Sun sports writer. Reach him at [email protected] or (702) 259-4088.
When the new women's basketball poll comes out today, it's conceiveable North Carolina may be ranked as high as No. 2, which would be its highest poll position since it won the national championship 10 years ago.
So based on UNLV's 84-76 loss to the Tar Heels in the Lady Rebel Shootout championship game at Cox Pavilion early Sunday evening that was even closer than the final score, I guess that makes the Lady Rebels No. 4 or 5.
Make that No. 5 or 6. I forgot about Central Florida.
There's still a lot of basketball to be played below the rim before the Lady Rebels, should they not win the Mountain West Conference tournament championship to earn an automatic bracket bid, take their usual spot among the NCAA's bubble-licious.
But Sunday was probably the last chance for the Lady Rebels to earn some credit with the selection committee against outside competition. So provided they don't discredit themselves as they did in a 60-58 loss to CF-Who last week in their home opener, competitive losses to North Carolina and another to then-No. 14 Minnesota in the season lid-lifter (77-69) shouldn't hurt UNLV at all in March -- especially given its best player was in street clothes for both games.
Naturally, an upset would have been huge. But having been to The Dance only once during the past decade, the whole idea behind upgrading the schedule was to show that the Lady Rebels can still boogie against Final Four-type competition -- which is what Minnesota was last year and what North Carolina could be again this year, given its 71-65 victory against mighty Connecticut in the Jimmy V Classic just eight days ago.
Like Chris Penn's character with the two left feet in "Footloose," the Lady Rebels aren't exactly there yet. But you didn't have to be Kevin Bacon to see the possibilities once Sherry McCracklin, the heart and soul of the team, returns to the lineup after the holidays and begins keeping the enemy honest with her fierce rebounding and continuously changing hair color.
On Sunday, McCracklin, who injured her Achilles' during a late summer pickup game, was reduced to leading the cheers on the bench as UNLV rallied from an early and seemingly insurmountable 31-13 deficit. There certainly wasn't much tar on the heels of the North Carolina players during the first 10 minutes as they came at the Lady Rebels in wave upon fast-breaking wave.
UNLV is easily the quickest and most athletic team in the Mountain West, but North Carolina made the Lady Rebels look like a Volkswagen on Pole Day at Indy. It was as if the Tar Heels were on a hockey power play. They were getting so many layups off the break it was as if they were playing 6-against-5.
And maybe they were. After a timeout, the officials did the math and discovered that North Carolina had six players on the court to UNLV's five and whistled the Tar Heels for a technical.
But in all seriousness, once coach Regina Miller impressed upon her team that sometimes when you run the floor you have to use reverse gear, it wasn't long before the Lady Rebels got back into the game by getting back on defense to interrupt Carolina's offensive flow.
It was 49-40 at halftime and got even closer after the break, when UNLV inexorably pulled within two points twice, the last inside of eight minutes to play. Still within major upset striking distance come crunch time, the Lady Rebels had several opportunities to cut the defecit to a single basket but couldn't get one -- or even two free throws -- when it mattered most.
To illustrate how close the Lady Rebels came to hoeing a Tobacco Road, they made a Top 5 team shoot 56 percent from the floor and sink 20 of its 23 free throws and 6 of its 11 3-point field-goal attempts to beat them. Were it not for Ivory Latta, perhaps the best point guard to wear Carolina Blue since Phil Ford (she also wears No. 12), North Carolina might have joined the bevy of elite teams (No. 1 Tennessee, UConn, Texas, Georgia) which have tasted premature defeat.
The Lady Rebels gave the UNC star a little too much Latta-tude. She scored 28 points and dished out seven assists, seemingly getting some or the other whenever UNLV got close to the hump it could never negotiate.
UNLV's Sheena Moore, who like InFini Robinson last year is slightly miscast as a point guard but does a better job of creating offense for herself, scored 25 points. RanDee Henry, who last year sometimes had a way of disappearing during the big games, had a lot under her sleeve in this one, finishing with 19 points and 9 rebounds.
That about covered the UNLV offense and against a top-caliber team such as North Carolina, two players aren't enough. But McCracklin will be back soon, and with its Three Amigas intact, there shouldn't be any team in the Mountain West (not even Utah) the Lady Rebels can't handle.
But if Sunday showed anything, it's that this might be the year UNLV sets its sights a little higher.
While nothing would have been finer than to beat Carolina, a competitive loss against one of the nation's best teams should do a lot for the Lady Rebels' confidence.
Where they go from here is up to them.
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