Offseason overhaul urgent for Rebels

There is a good chance you missed this: It was Thursday night in a city located 110 miles north of Los Angeles when a college basketball team lost for the first time since Nov. 18.

New Mexico State lost at Cal State Bakersfield, snapping a 20-game win streak and coming within one victory of equaling the longest such mark in school history.

And at some point, you can be assured Marvin Menzies learned of the outcome.

The first-year UNLV coach saw his Rebels

lose their sixth straight game Saturday, falling to San Jose State 76-74 before an announced gathering of 10,349 at the Thomas & Mack Center.

There might not have been 3,000 in the place, and it was unquestionably the smallest crowd for a UNLV home game this late in a season in decades.

Memo to the athletic department official who once uttered these shortsighted and foolish words about marketing UNLV sports: “Basketball takes care of itself.”

Think again. Not when things are this bad.

UNLV (10-16) began playing basketball in 1958.

It has never lost 17 games in a season.

It’s one defeat from doing so.

The collapse of its program is almost sad to watch, but knowing why it collapsed is even worse.

It is, then, on Menzies to try to repair the ship’s hull while navigating a stormy sea of loss after loss, and while he works to discover how to plug enough leaks so that the Rebels might actually win another game this season, the New Mexico State program from which he arrived challenges for another Western Athletic Conference title.

“Obviously, we’re really pleased for everyone there and proud how they continue to develop that program,” Menzies said. “It’s not just this year. A lot of people were involved for several years positioning them to have this kind of season. We had the luxury of time there, the last four to five years to really develop kids and get things rolling.

“Here (at UNLV), we have to win sooner rather than later.”

It’s not as easy to suggest Menzies could or should build the Rebels in the same manner he did New Mexico State, where over nine seasons the Aggies never finished below third place in the WAC, won three regularseason titles and made five NCAA Tournament fields.

Where the team in Las Cruces could absolutely win the Mountain West this season.

But it’s also true that the recruiting net one can cast at UNLV compared to New Mexico State is substantially larger, and while stars attached to a prospect’s name are often overvalued and ultimately prove meaningless, more doors will open when knocked on by the coach of the Rebels.

Menzies needs to pound them down.

New Mexico State can take unproven prep players and turn them into four-year program guys while mixing in a few from the junior college ranks and perhaps a fifth-year transfer or two, but the pressure for UNLV to win now and recruit at a national level makes that a difficult formula to master, particularly the part about program guys.

Which is a shame, given it’s one area the Rebels have lacked while missing the past three NCAA fields.

UNLV is a collection of new faces this season, and yet that theme could repeat itself next year, and probably should. The Rebels play three seniors significant minutes, but it shouldn’t surprise anyone if Menzies also recruits over several who are scheduled to return in 2017-18.

Some won’t, of course, meaning there will be the inevitable shake-up of a lastplace team in need of much more talent. It’s a tough but needed part of the business.

Menzies had only one losing season (2010-11) at New Mexico State and won at least 23 games in each of his final five years there. On Saturday, his team had 17 offensive rebounds to seven for San Jose State, shot 15 more free throws than the Spartans, had more bench points and secondchance points and points off turnovers … and still managed to lose at home.

Which, if not impossible, is beyond unlikely.

“I don’t know if it’s frustration,” Menzies said. “It’s tough losing games. But it’s also challenging, figuring out how to get through this. I’m not walking around every day thinking about not winning games. I have to focus on developing the guys in our program and recruiting. I don’t have time to be down. I have too much work to get done.”

He did enough in Las Cruces to build a heck of a team.

Whether he can here, once in possession of what a few full years of recruiting could afford him, is to be decided. Contact columnist Ed Graney at egraney@ reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4618. He can be a heard on “Seat and Ed” on Fox Sports 1340 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. Follow @edgraney on Twitter.