And because we had been so long waiting for another winning basketball team to give us reason to unite like those supernatural teams who played under Jerry Tarkanian during his 19 historic years and 509 victories in Las Vegas did, because, in the words of Kevin Kruger, our starting point guard this year and the son of the man who has given us a team to call our own again, coach Lon Kruger, "Vegas, sports-wise, is a basketball town." One of us, Moses Scurry, says he hasn't felt like this since he played, back on the legendary 1989-90 squad that brought Las Vegas its sole national title, and on the 1990-91 team, which countless hoops aficionados still consider the best college basketball team ever, despite having lost in the Final Four that year. Moses Scurry says he hasn't really had a reason to attend UNLV games until now, and now he knows what it was like to be with us in the stands when his teams stirred the city into unforgettable frenzies 17 years ago.
We were 16,204 strong on Saturday night, and we were engaged, excitable and as boisterous as a crowd twice our size, and when our boys demonstrated the courage and perseverance and grit to come back, on the back of senior Michael Umeh, from a 16-3 deficit to open the game, take the lead on a three-pointer by Wink Adams and secure the victory with the stellar play of seniors Kevin Kruger, Wendell White, Gaston Essengue and Joel Anthony, we roared. "Obviously, memories from this will be good for a long time," said Coach Kruger. "It feels great, the satisfaction that the fans are receiving, the players. Seeing so many people coming together, feeling good about the direction we're headed—that's where the satisfaction is."
We had been slow to commit, because we in Las Vegas don't give out our time, money or enthusiasm for free. There are too many options in this city, too many things to do on a Saturday night. And so the Runnin' Rebels had to earn it. And they did. And we came. We watched them topple No. 14 Air Force in late February; we paid homage to the seniors on the final game of the regular season, with 18,069 of us there at the T&M, the biggest crowd in nearly a quarter century; and we got behind our boys during the conference tournament, encouraging them when they, like body-punching boxers, wore down Utah, Colorado State and BYU (in that order) with their asphyxiating pressure defense, setting a new tournament record for combined margin of victory in those three games, at more than 50. We held our collective breath every time an opposing offensive player came within arm's reach of Anthony and his impeccable timing, anticipating yet another rejection; we clapped our hands as Adams got all over the other teams' point guards even before they crossed half-court; and we stood in such awe of Kevin Kruger during the first two games, in which he could not miss a shot, scoring 21 points each night (and adding 13 total assists) that by the championship game against BYU we all chanted "M-V-P! M-V-P! M-V-P!" every time he touched the ball, a demand that would be acquiesced to by the MWC in the aftermath of our championship victory.
It was our 17th straight win at the T&M, and in many ways it reminded us of the halcyon days of the beloved one, Tark the Shark. Before Jerry Tarkanian arrived at UNLV in 1973, we were known as simply the Rebels. And then, in his second year, when our team was predicted to finish fourth in the conference, he instituted a high-pressure defense, a venerable on-court work ethic, a fast-paced game and a style of basketball that was altogether symbolic of our city, and we became the Runnin' Rebels.
"We had the glitz and glamour of the Strip," says Tark. "But mostly, we were a blue-collar team for a blue-collar town."
They went 29 and 2 that year, and according to a report from the Review-Journal back then, "fans loved the new game. They loved Tark the Shark and his teams."
It's true: We did. (And even if we were not alive or living in Vegas back then, we soon inherited that love and veneration for Tark all the same when we got here.) And we continued to adore the Runnin' Rebels as they built a 78-game winning streak at home in the mid-'70s and earned our first trip to the Final Four in 1977. We overran the T&M when it opened in 1983, with our boys No. 1 in the nation, and according to Tark it got so loud in there we couldn't even hear the person sitting next to us speak. "It was just an incredible environment," Tark says. "Like nowhere else in college basketball."
Tark loved Las Vegas, and we loved him back, above all when he returned us to the Final Four in 1987, and then, in 1990, when he led us to a national championship.
"This is obviously a great win for this team, for our community, and for the city of Las Vegas," Tark told the Las Vegas Sun after that monumental win.
The next year we went undefeated in 34 games, blowing every opponent out of the water (by more than 33 points, an NCAA record for average margin of victory), before losing in the Final Four in what most experts deem the biggest upset in the history of college hoops. Tark has called those Runnin' Rebels the greatest defensive team of all time.
That loss to Duke during the Final Four in 1991 broke our hearts, and it persists inexorable and haunting in our memories because it marked the point of departure from our Edenic days at the top of the college basketball world. And, oh, how we have fallen. Since then we've had nine different coaches, only two appearances in the Big Dance, and not a single win there. No, not one.
We brought in venerable coach Charlie Spoonhour at the turn of the new millennium, and while he didn't get us any conference tournament championships or any invitations to the NCAA tournament, he did lay the groundwork for our team to return to glory.
"All of us coaches are mindful of it," Spoonhour says of Tark's legacy. "I never considered it a burden. I thought it was a positive thing."
Several legends from the past, like Greg Anthony, the point guard on the national championship team and now, after 11 years in the NBA, an astute and articulate pro basketball commentator for ESPN, have gone on record as saying that no one is as fit to revive Tark's legacy as coach Lon Kruger. He succeeded Spoonhour in 2004, and for the first time since then he is working with, by and large, his players. Just as it was with Tark, many of them are transfers from junior colleges and other universities, including four of the team's starting eight, and they, having bought into Kruger's philosophy of defense and hard work, of which Tark was a master, have produced our best record since Tark left UNLV in 1992. "Man, they're not big, but they play hard," says Moses Scurry, a native of New York who has remained in Las Vegas after all these years because of the unconditional love and respect he still receives in town. "In that way, they're a lot like we were." We had been predicted to finish sixth in the MWC when this year began, and at first we struggled. But then, at the end of October, Coach Kruger says, we found our identity, that of a industrious, physical team that defends the ball with stark aggressiveness, and since then we have been gradually improving every day, to the point where, after victories over Utah and Colorado State in the initial rounds of the MWC tournament, the Utes' coach said, "We haven't played anyone who pressures like UNLV; I can't think of anyone who compares," and the Rams' coach stated, "Nobody beats UNLV."
And so we rushed the court last Saturday because we didn't want the sheer raging fun which our boys had inspired during the game to fade. One of us, Coach Spoonhour, illuminated with pride and having a darned good time from his seat reserved for an honorable old coach, said: "They're awfully good, and they are such a fun team to watch."
It's reciprocal, says Kevin Kruger. "To go out there and see 13,000, 14,000 at a conference tournament championship game, we can't ask for anything better than that. As players, that was fun to play in." And beneficial, too, says his father. "The crowd picks you up a bit. You're a little fatigued, you get a deflection, you get a loose ball, you convert that offensively, and the crowd energizes you." And then, again, his son: "The fans are responsible for a number of victories just by showing up and being loud and getting on the other teams."
Rushing the court, celebrating, some of us still in our silver UNLV jackets some 20 years old now, and in unison exalting our boys, who, at least for the day, were kings, we remembered the glory of our past, Tark's era, because that is our heritage, not just as basketball fans, not just as UNLV students or alumni, but also as a community, and we yearn for it again.
"I think it's possible," says Shawn Marion, a former Runnin' Rebel and now an all-star forward with the NBA's Phoenix Suns. "Because Vegas loves basketball, especially if it's a winning team."
One thing we'll need, though, is more firepower. (Unlike those great teams of the early '90s, our Runnin' Rebels today do not play above the rim; and right now we do not possess the offensive fecundity to score 100 points a game, as Tark's teams did.) And we will need it because, in Las Vegas, we love big, excessive spectacles.
It will be up to Coach Kruger to lure the elite recruits, those boys big and quick and strong by nature with whom, granted they buy into Kruger's ways, we can start to expect Final Four appearances and national championships once again.
In short, ol' Tark the Shark sums up in his book Runnin' Rebel what we've been trying to say here all along:
"The great part of college basketball is the players, the fans, the fun, and producing a winning team that gets everyone excited. When we had it going at UNLV, it was like nothing else. Las Vegas was the greatest college basketball town in America."