Opening victory is one to be treasured

There is no such thing as a routine victory when you have lost eight straight football games dating to last season and 29 of your last 35 dating to 2005. There is no such thing as grinding out wins for UNLV.

You don’t just celebrate nights when the scoreboard flashes in your favor as the final seconds pass. You treasure them.

The Rebels might have been expected to dismiss visiting Utah State on Saturday night, but point spreads mean nothing when applied to programs that have struggled so mightily finding success.

Really good teams might not take much from a 27-17 win against what is traditionally one of the nation’s poorest Division I-A outfits. For UNLV, so desperate to finally travel a road that doesn’t end with just a few wins over a season, opening 2008 on the winning side is invaluable.

Go ask San Diego State this morning about games you can’t possibly lose. UNLV refused such a notorious beginning to its season, instead proving true the belief that better players who execute usually walk away the winner.

Still, this isn’t when we see if UNLV is as improved as coach Mike Sanford suggests. Next week is. When the “State” gets dropped from the equation, leaving only the Utah part.

When the team that might win two games this season is replaced with one that might not lose two.

Here’s the thing: Normally, you would look at the UNLV-Utah game and assume it a classic trap for the Utes. They survived at Michigan on Saturday by two points and should have won by two touchdowns. They only allowed the Wolverines 203 total yards, including just 36 rushing. They didn’t walk out of The Big House. They flew.

Normally, preparing next for a UNLV team picked last in the Mountain West Conference would be tougher than finding a Brigham Young fan club on the Salt Lake City campus.

But before taking flight from Ann Arbor, you know Utah coach Kyle Whittingham reminded his team of its next opponent, of the 27-0 defeat in Las Vegas last season, of how Sanford and running back Frank Summers questioned whether or not the Utes were fearful of tackling the UNLV player.

“It’s very evident on tape,” Sanford told the R-J’s Mark Anderson two days following the shutout win, “they were avoiding trying to tackle him, no question in my mind.”

Sanford, of course, spent part of last month’s conference preseason media gathering to suggest those quotes were ” completely taken out context” and “blown out of proportion.”

Don’t you love how the old “out of context” lines come out when coaches and players realize quotes might come back and bite them by a motivated opponent that also happens to be really good?

Nothing was blown out of proportion, nor was context an issue. Sanford had 48 hours to think about. He said it and meant it. His team played terrific that September night last year. It finally beat someone that mattered. He took a few shots at a program whose offense he once coordinated. It was nothing malicious. Steve Spurrier talks more trash in his sleep.

Why would Sanford backtrack now by insinuating he didn’t mean it? How often has UNLV had an opportunity the last four years to stick out its chest after a big win? Sanford should spend the next week talking about that victory. He won’t, but what do the Rebels have to lose?

If they somehow discover a way to win at Utah, it will be unbelievably deserved. UNLV isn’t going to get the Utes’ best shot. The Rebels will get even more than it.

They need to be better at most everything from the Utah State win merely because of the increased level of opposing skill.

Omar Clayton needs to play an entire game at quarterback as he did the first half Saturday, when he was quite good. Freshman wide receiver Phillip Payne, who looked super in his first collegiate effort, again needs to give Clayton a third option behind Casey Flair and Ryan Wolfe, of which there are not two better Mountain West receivers.

Offensive coaches can’t for such long stretches forget Summers is standing in the backfield and that it’s not against the rules to hand him the ball on consecutive snaps.

A defense that made Utah State quarterbacks Sean Setzer and Diondre Borel look better than it should must realize Brian Johnson of Utah is an entirely different monster to slay.

Winning the opener was more than routine. It mattered more than others might believe, and should for a team hoping to find that different path.

You can’t overstate 1-0 for UNLV. It might have been the outcome everybody predicted, but sure things around here haven’t been all that regular a theme. The Rebels should treasure it, and then begin thinking about the team that avoided tackling Summers.

Or at least that what he and Sanford said. In context. In proportion.

Every word of it.

Ed Graney can be reached at 383-4618 or egraney@reviewjournal.com.