Rebels ought to host Duke in outdoor game

Now that Mike Krzyzewski has No. 903 in his pocket, somebody at UNLV should ask Michael Gaughan or Steve Wynn to call him, to ask what the Duke kids, as Coach K refers to them, are doing around this time next year.

On Friday, while Coach K was acquiring career win 901 in a 77-76 nailbiter over Belmont, which must have sneaked a couple of locked-out NBA players into its lineup, No. 1 North Carolina was defeating Michigan State 67-55 in a game played outdoors, on an aircraft carrier in San Diego Harbor on Veterans Day.

The sunset was a purple-and-orange spectacular, and the rims had nets, and nobody pulled a knife. So this wasn't basketball played outside the way I remember it.

Still, it was pretty cool.

What the game lacked in aesthetics -- there was slipping and sliding when a mist rolled in -- it more than made up for in media exposure and coolness.

Isn't imitation the sincerest form of flattery? Without Britney Spears, could there have been Jessica Simpson? OK, bad analogy. Without Coke, there wouldn't have been Pepsi, and then I'd have to start drinking coffee in the morning.

So the Rebels should consider hosting one of these outdoor games themselves. It would be huge. Perhaps not as huge as the flight deck of the USS Carl Vinson, but at least as big as a couple of battleships and a dreadnought.

The logistics of putting a battleship on Lake Mead at first glance seems complicated, and the homeowners association at Lake Las Vegas would go ballistic upon discovering a dreadnought docked at the reopened Casino MonteLago. Dreadnoughts, 16-inch heavy guns and sailors on shore leave reduce one's property value.

So the game would have to be played on the Strip, without aircraft carriers, battleships and dreadnoughts.

I think ESPN still would be interested.

The World Wide Leader in Sports -- at least when The Mtn. isn't showing Wyoming vs. Colorado State volleyball highlights -- still would be intrigued, because although UNLV hasn't been to the Final Four since 1991, those four letters still have Final Four cache. And in Dave Rice, the Rebels have a bright, young coach with ties to that tradition.

That's a storyline. ESPN loves storylines. Plus, Rice coached The Jimmer at Brigham Young. ESPN also loves The Jimmer.

Though the opponent doesn't have to be Duke, it should be Duke, because of history that lingers and resonates. That's another storyline.

Gaughan and Wynn -- add a couple of articles, and you'd have a heck of a title for a romance novel -- are friends with Coach K. The casino moguls could have this ball rolling down Las Vegas Boulevard in no time. Coach K knows Jay Bilas. As for Dickie V. and Andy Katz, those guys will go wherever you tell them to go. Especially Vitale.

The machinations could be worked out. It used to take a bomb threat or Sammy Davis Jr. dying to even think of closing down the Strip. Now, they do it for stock car drivers and marathon runners. All it takes is a guy thinking outside the box who can promise casino traffic.

Know where the idea to play a basketball game on an aircraft carrier came from? From an athletic director, at Michigan State. Mark Hollis also was responsible for the Spartans playing rival Michigan in an outdoor hockey game at Spartan Stadium. The Cold War attracted a record crowd of 74,544. When the teams met in a rematch at Michigan Stadium, 104,173 showed up.

Now that Boise State is out of Bowl Championship Series contention, UNLV athletic director Jim Livengood talks about how the Rebels need to generate alternate revenue streams amid the tsunami of a budget crunch and a weak economy.

Well, the notion of an outdoor basketball game against Duke sounds like an alternate revenue stream to me.

You're probably not going to do 80,000 on the Strip, unless it's also New Year's Eve, and by then Anthony Marshall's jump shot would have serious icicles.

And you're probably not going to attract the president and the first lady, who were on hand for the aircraft carrier game. By this time next year, the battleground states will be lousy with empty promises, and the election will be over.

But one would bet that former Mayor Oscar Goodman and Carrot Top would be happy to serve as honorary coaches.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ron Kantowski can be reached at rkantowski@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0352. Follow him on Twitter: @ronkantowski.