UNLV Hit in Wallet by Big West : Basketball: School is ineligible for 1992 conference tournament, assessed $100,000 for role in television lawsuit.

The Big West Conference has barred Nevada Las Vegas from competing in next season’s conference basketball tournament and also directed the school to pay $100,000 in fees arising from a lawsuit involving the league’s television package.

The action, taken at the conference’s spring meeting in San Jose, left UNLV officials reeling.

“It let us know exactly how (the conference’s 10 other schools) feel, that’s for sure,” UNLV interim Athletic Director Dennis Finfrock said Friday.

The decision to bar UNLV from the 1992 Big West tournament ensures that the conference will have an automatic qualifier in the ’92 NCAA tournament.

The NCAA has prohibited UNLV from appearing in postseason competition or on television during the 1991-92 season as a final penalty stemming from the 1977 infractions case that prompted Rebel Coach Jerry Tarkanian to take the NCAA to court.

The Big West passed a bylaw Thursday that says that if a league team is ineligible to compete in an NCAA championship event, it also is ineligible to participate in a conference championship that season.

According to Finfrock, the Big West Council chose not to impose a provision in the bylaw that would prohibit UNLV from sharing in revenue generated by the tournament, which will be held in Long Beach next season for the fourth consecutive year.

But the council wasn’t doing UNLV a favor, Finfrock said, because, without Rebel fans at the tournament, schools probably will lose money rather than make it.

“We still have to buy $15,000 worth of tickets (for the tournament),” he said. “It could wind up costing us $20,000, and we’re not going to play in the thing.”

UNLV also took a financial hit when the council directed the school to pick up $100,000 in fees stemming from a lawsuit over the conference’s TV package for basketball.

The package, put together by Creative Sports Marketing Inc., of Charlotte, N.C., gave SportsChannel America the right to televise any Big West games not carried on network TV. However, United International Productions of Los Angeles, contending that it had a valid contract to televise such games involving UNLV, sued SportsChannel in District Court in Las Vegas.

The suit was settled out of court last December, and the Big West, citing the role of UNLV interests in the matter, wants the school to bear the cost of $100,000 in fees arising from the suit.