Rebels foil Badgers, move to 3-0

In pressure situations, Chace Stanback delivered time and again on the offensive end, putting UNLV in position to steal a win.

The quick hands of Justin Hawkins finished the job in the nick of time.

"It was very intense," Hawkins said. "Defense wins games."

Hawkins stole an inbounds pass, was fouled and hit two free throws with 6.7 seconds left to help the Rebels escape with a 68-65 victory over Wisconsin on Saturday at the Thomas & Mack Center.

Stanback scored a career-high 25 points and sank a jumper from the left wing with 56 seconds left to put UNLV ahead by one.

"I just had to knock the shots down," said Stanback, who scored 12 points in the final 9:34. "It was just a great experience. It felt like a March Madness game.

"We knew it was going to be tough beginning to end. We just had to fight through it."

On the defensive end, the ability of Hawkins, a 6-foot-3-inch sophomore guard, to fight off a screen and swipe the ball from the Badgers' 6-10 Jon Leuer made all the difference.

After the Rebels' Oscar Bellfield missed a free throw, Wisconsin coach Bo Ryan called timeout with 14 seconds left. Ryan set up a play for Leuer, who misfired from about 12 feet. The Badgers won the struggle for the rebound, as they did most of the game.

Wisconsin's Mike Bruesewitz tried to bounce a pass to Leuer, but Hawkins switched on a screen and beat Leuer to the ball.

"It was a clean steal," Hawkins said. "I was very surprised. I was expecting a lob pass to a 6-10 guy."

After a foul and timeout, Hawkins hit both free throws for his only points.

"I was a little nervous hearing the crowd screaming," he said. "My teammates told me to calm down and breathe and knock them down like it's practice."

With the crowd of 14,736 in an uproar, the Badgers' Jordan Taylor, defended by senior guard Tre'Von Willis, missed a 3-pointer before the buzzer.

"We definitely wanted to foul there as the ball was dribbled across midcourt," UNLV coach Lon Kruger said. "Tre said he meant to foul but just didn't, and I don't know exactly what that means, but we got away with it."

Stanback and Bellfield (18 points) each made four 3-pointers for the Rebels, who improved to 3-0 and picked up an impressive victory over one of the Big Ten's top teams.

Taylor had 19 points to lead Wisconsin, which dropped to 2-1 and is ranked 25th in the ESPN/USA Today coaches poll. Taylor scored 16 in the first half, trading shots with Bellfield most of the way, but he was held down after halftime.

Leuer, who was averaging 23 points through two games, shot 3-for-11 and finished with 10 points.

"It was just what we thought. I thought it would come down to the last five minutes," Ryan said. "(Stanback) hit some big shots, and that's all we needed to do down the stretch was have somebody hit one there in the last possession."

Stanback opened the second half with a 3-pointer and just got hotter. His 17-footer put UNLV on top 62-58 with 3:33 to go. Leuer responded by making two free throws. Back-and-forth scores were the trend in a game that had 13 ties and 13 lead changes.

"Chace has really been shooting the ball well," Kruger said. "We couldn't get a stop on the other end to create any margin, but we kept scoring at critical times."

The Rebels prevailed despite losing a majority of the rebounding battles and getting little from Willis, who returned from a four-game suspension and had four points in 23 minutes.

UNLV shot 49 percent (24 of 49) from the field and held Wisconsin to 19 field goals and 36.5 percent shooting.

"We were playing a really good team nose to nose for 40 minutes," Kruger said. "It's a really good early-season test."

Contact reporter Matt Youmans at myoumans@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2907.