UNLV Favored by PCAA Coaches

Nevada Las Vegas, which has won the Pacific Coast Athletic Assn. basketball title every season since it joined the conference in 1982, has been picked by a poll of PCAA coaches to win its sixth championship.

UNLV, which lost six seniors from a 37-2 team that advanced to the NCAA Final Four, returns two starters--Jarvis Basnight and Gerald Paddio.

Cal State Fullerton, which returns its top two scorers, Richard Morton and Henry Turner, was chosen to finish third, behind San Jose State.

UC Irvine, which returns three starters but lost leading scorer Scott Brooks, tied for eighth place with Cal State Long Beach.

In a poll of women’s coaches, Cal State Long Beach, which last year advanced to the women’s NCAA Final Four and lost to national champion Tennessee in the semifinals, was chosen unanimously to repeat as PCAA champion. UCI was chosen fifth, and Cal State Fullerton seventh.

The men’s poll:

Team Points

1. UNLV 94 (6)

2. San Jose State 88 (2)

3. Cal State Fullerton 86 (2)

4. Utah State 63

5. UC Santa Barbara 49

6. New Mexico State 46

7. Fresno State 39

8. (tie) UC Irvine 35

8. (tie) CS Long Beach 35

10. Pacific 15

First-place votes in parentheses.