Antics aside, fiery Boylen gets most out of Utes

Lost amid all the craziness — the screaming and yelling and gritting of teeth, the part where he calls a referee crew the Three Stooges, the part where an opposing player drives the lane and Boylen screams, “Block that (bleep!),” the part where he is allowed to be halfway onto the court during play and officials allow it, the part where he screams about a changeable error and instructs the scoreboard official to “not start that frickin’ clock!” — Boylen annually offers a basketball team that plays its tail off for him.

It did so again Saturday night, and in the process erased for UNLV what was a significant Mountain West Conference road victory just a week ago, because when you lose at home to Utah 73-69 before the season’s largest crowd of 16,594, you give back the success found in winning at New Mexico.

It’s not a good formula for a team hoping to win a regular-season title.

The Rebels deserved to lose Saturday as much as they deserved to beat the Lobos and San Diego State in consecutive games. This was one of those nights, and there hasn’t been many this season, when UNLV’s lack of a consistent inside presence cost it dearly.

One of those nights when all that talk about how three bodies can supply the Rebels enough numbers and defensive tenacity to equal one competent big man didn’t prove close to being true.

One of those nights when Matt Shaw, Darris Santee and Brice Massamba combine for seven points, 10 rebounds, no blocks and shoot 0-for-3 from the line, when for the most part you wouldn’t know they were on the floor.

Utah, on the other hand, had a big guy everyone knew was on the floor. At least everyone who could see.

David Foster goes 7 feet 3 inches and 255 pounds as a sophomore. He went for 13 points and six rebounds, but, more important, blocked six shots and altered several more.

He got inside the heads of those driving for UNLV. He made them think. He isn’t anywhere near a dominant player, but he did a nice job in 28 minutes frustrating UNLV players.

The Rebels also missed 12 free-throw attempts, but might have overcome such miscues had they done a better job offensively than shooting 40 percent from the field, shooting 1-for-12 on 3-pointers and finishing more when attacking, especially in the first 20 minutes.

They were far too passive in the first half and ultimately paid for it.

“Their big guys bothered us on some drives,” UNLV coach Lon Kruger said. “It was tough for our guys to score over their size.

“… Any time you don’t hold serve at home, you don’t like it. It’s important in any conference to hold serve and then sneak some out on the road.”

UNLV saw the good Utah, the one that has wins against Illinois and Michigan and at Louisiana State, not the one with losses to Idaho and Seattle and Pepperdine.

Know this about the Utes: While often during games he might seem one more outburst short of a few nice men in white coats coming to take him for a ride, Boylen has followed the longtime Utah script of putting long, rangy, defensive-minded players on the floor.

He can coach. His kids play really hard. This isn’t one of the better Utah teams the Mountain West has known, but on a given night it can outclass a team that was a 12-point favorite on a Thomas & Mack floor where it had won 34 of its past 37 league games.

“Very disappointing,” UNLV sophomore Chace Stanback said. “You don’t want to lose any game, but especially at home.

“They bothered us in the paint. We’ll just have to get back to practice and work on that.

“Hopefully we can go have a good road trip.”

It is important for many reasons but particularly this: UNLV plays at Colorado State and Texas Christian this week, teams the Rebels dropped road games to last season and ones they can’t afford to and still expect to make a championship run.

Brigham Young probably is not going to lose at such places. You have to enter these next two games assuming that.

The Rebels gave a game back Saturday and deserved such a fate. Utah was better. All in all, not a good night for UNLV.

But it was a really good one for the coach who I believe just yelled, “Block that (bleep)!” again.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ed Graney can be reached at egraney@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4618. He also can be heard weeknights from 11 p.m. to 1 a.m. on “The Sports Scribes” on KDWN-AM (720) and www.kdwn.com.