UNLV’s Lindy La Rocque: ‘Whatever we did to this point doesn’t matter’

UNLV women’s basketball coach Lindy La Rocque knows what’s at stake this week.

“Everyone’s at 0-0,” she said. “Whatever we did, whatever anyone did up to this point, kind of doesn’t matter.”

The No. 1-seeded Lady Rebels (23-6) will play No. 9 Utah State (11-18) at noon Monday in the quarterfinals of the Mountain West tournament at the Thomas & Mack Center. Utah State rallied in the fourth quarter to defeat No. 8 Fresno State 80-75 Sunday in the first round.

Fresh off its first outright regular-season conference championship since winning the Big West in 1989-90, UNLV has a chance to continue making program history. The Lady Rebels haven’t won a conference tournament since capturing the Big West event in 1994.

But they know it won’t be easy.

“Everybody’s coming for us,” senior Justice Ethridge said. “We know we just have to come out and be ourselves, expect everyone’s best game and bring our best effort.”

The tournament champion gets an automatic berth into the NCAA Tournament. The conference isn’t expected to get any at-large bids, as UNLV is the only team in ESPN’s bracketology.

The Mountain West hasn’t earned an at-large bid since 2010, something La Rocque and her players are well aware of.

“We know there is no guarantee that we are going to the NCAA Tournament,” forward Khayla Rooks said. “There’s definitely some urgency that we have to win these three games so we can do what we wanted to do and achieve what we wanted to achieve.”

UNLV, which hasn’t played in the NCAA Tournament since 2002, enters the conference tournament having lost two of its past three games.

Rooks said that stretch has been a good reminder of the Lady Rebels’ vulnerability, especially after a 12-game winning streak helped carry them to the conference title.

And if the Lady Rebels need any more reminders, they need to look no further than last season, La Rocque’s first as the team’s coach. UNLV was the No. 2 seed for the conference tournament, but lost in the quarterfinals to eventual champion Wyoming.

“We had an unsettling experience in the tournament last year, getting beat in our first round,” La Rocque said. “We don’t want to let that happen again.”

Utah State outscored Fresno State 36-21 in the fourth quarter to advance to play the Lady Rebels. UNLV won both regular-season matchups, 86-68 and 72-60.

The championship game is at 7 p.m. Wednesday and will be televised on CBSSN.

Contact reporter Andy Yamashita at ayamashita@reviewjournal.com. Follow @ANYamashita on Twitter.