NCAA West at Boise, Ida. : Butler Does It as UNLV Advances

DePaul played Nevada Las Vegas in its first game this season, and as it turned out, the Blue Demons played UNLV in their final game as well.

The Rebels beat DePaul during November with their outside shooting. This time, it was an inside job--a 23-point performance by center David Butler--along with UNLV’s pressure defense and nearly flawless ballhandling.

After being tied at halftime, UNLV broke the game open with a 12-0 run and scored an 85-70 victory Saturday before a crowd of 12,428 at the Boise State Pavilion.

The victory sent fourth-seeded UNLV into a National Collegiate Athletic Assn. West Regional semifinal against top-seeded and top-ranked Arizona Thursday in Denver.

When UNLV beat DePaul, 86-77, in the Maui tournament, guard Greg Anthony scored 28 points, and no other Rebel had more than 12. Butler scored only four in that game.

But that was before UNLV developed the inside game that has paved the way to a late-season run in which the team has won eight consecutive games, and 13 of its last 14.

As Anthony describes it, that was before the Rebels wised up.

“If you don’t take advantage of all David can do, you hurt yourself and your team. He can open it up for the guards. You’d be a fool not to use him. Earlier in the year, we were all fools.”

Besides making considerable use of Butler, UNLV forged this victory with pressure defense--”tremendous,” DePaul Coach Joey Meyer called it--and with outstanding ballhandling. The Rebels committed only three turnovers in the game--”We usually have that many by the first foul shot,” UNLV Coach Jerry Tarkanian said--and Anthony, the point guard, had none.

Stacey Augmon added 17 points for UNLV, and Moses Scurry had 13.

DePaul, behind the performance of guard Terence Greene, erased a 10-point deficit to tie the score, 40-40, at halftime. Greene, who finished with 29 points and seven rebounds, was able to penetrate in the first half, passing to Stanley Brundy underneath.

That didn’t happen often in the second half. Brundy, the former Crenshaw High School player who finished his DePaul career with more points this season (642) than any player in school history other than Mark Aguirre, scored only three points in the second half.

And the Blue Demons, after being tied, 44-44, didn’t score again for almost four minutes.

Before Greene made two free throws to break the spell, UNLV had a 56-44 lead. It would never be fewer than 10 again.

“They kicked it into a gear we don’t have in the second half,” Meyer said. “The only way to stem the tide was to put the ball in the basket, and we couldn’t do it. They just outran us.”

DePaul ended the season as it began it. But along the way, the Blue Demons had a run of their own. After being 10-9 at one point, they went 11-3 the rest of the way, losing only to St. John’s, Notre Dame and UNLV.

For UNLV (28-7), the road continues.