No. 1 UNLV Whips UC Santa Barbara : Big West: Runnin’ Rebels extend streak to 25 games with 88-71 victory as Hunt leads the way with 26 points.

The streak goes on for top-ranked Nevada Las Vegas, a team that seems bent on making history instead of repeating it.

The Rebels, upset victims in two of their previous three games at UC Santa Barbara’s Events Center, swamped the Gauchos as expected, 88-71, in a Big West Conference game before a standing-room-only crowd of more than 6,000.

Las Vegas’ victory was its 25th in a row, dating to a 78-70 loss at Santa Barbara last February. The Rebels are 14-0 this season, 8-0 in the Big West Conference.

Santa Barbara, which got a game-high 27 points from forward Gary Gray, fell to 8-7 and 3-4, but managed to hold Las Vegas closer than its 13 previous opponents this season.

The Rebels’ closest margin had been 20-point victories over Michigan State and Pacific.

The Gauchos kept things close for the game’s first 26 minutes, then fell victim to a 12-4 run during which the Rebels scored by threes.

Anderson Hunt, who scored a team-high 26 points, led the charge. His three-point shot with 12:50 to play gave the Rebels a 59-45 advantage.

Coming in shooting 44%--38% from three-point range--Hunt made 10 of 16 shots against the Gauchos, including six of eight three-pointers.

All-American forward Larry Johnson had 12 points and seven rebounds for Las Vegas. He has scored in double figures in all 54 of his collegiate games.

The signals flashed early at UC Santa Barbara’s Events Center on Monday, all apparent forewarnings of an impending rout.

Twice in the past three seasons, Santa Barbara had managed to upset Las Vegas in the friendly confines of what is affectionately known as the Thunderdome.

But the possibility of history repeating itself was slipping away--quickly.

In the two minutes that followed tipoff, the Gauchos managed to commit precisely the two blunders Coach Jerry Pimm had told them they couldn’t afford. They made turnovers and allowed the Rebels to patrol the offensive boards almost at will.

Santa Barbara didn’t exactly ease into these trends, either.

The Gauchos came out of the gate and committed turnovers the first four times down the floor, allowing the Rebels to score 10 unanswered points.

Before the game, Pimm had warned of the potentially dangerous combination of an experienced playmaker going up against the Rebels’ swarming defense.

“The past few years we’ve had experienced point guards when we went up against them,” Pimm said. “Not having that has been the scary part of this whole season.”