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2002 POSTSEASON EDITION
UNLV (5-7, 3-4 MOUNTAIN WEST)
SEASON NOTES
In 2002: UNLV (5-7) played more bowl teams in the regular season (six) than any year in history ... The Rebels reached the five-victory mark for only the fourth time in the last 15 years ... UNLV led the Mountain West Conference in total offense with 409.5 yards per game and finished 15th in the nation in rushing with 214 YPG ... The Rebels opened the season on national television (ESPN2) for the second consecutive year for the first time ever by hosting No. 25 Wisconsin before a state-record crowd ... UNLV won its first overtime game in history in five attempts by downing Wyoming in a wild 49-48 affair ... The Rebels upset conference champion and then-13th-ranked Colorado State to close the campaign ... UNLV downed a ranked opponent for the second time in their 35-year history and for the first time since 1981 ... The Rebels won their final game of the regular season for the third consecutive year after having previously lost seven consecutive finales ... UNLV head coach John Robinson earned his 200th career coaching victory (college and NFL) with a 21-17 win over rival UNR ... The Rebels finished 3-0 in games televised by SportsWest Productions in 2002 and improved to 9-4 all-time on the network ... Sophomore safety Jamaal Brimmer was named MWC Defensive Player of the Year ... QB Jason Thomas finished second at the school in total offense for a career with 6,525 yards ... RB Joe Haro became only the fourth Rebel in history to rush for more than 2,000 yards in a career (2,013) ... OL Tony Terrell finished second all-time at the school with 45 career starts and was one of just 11 I-A players in the nation named to the AFCA Good Works Team ... Sophomore LB Adam Seward led the MWC with 133 tackles ... UNLV had five MWC players of the week and is the only school to have at least one winner in all three categories (offense, defense and special teams) all four years of the league's existence ... Two Rebels (Brimmer & Terrell) earned First Team All-MWC while three made the second team (Haro, Seward and WR Earvin Johnson) in the official coaches' poll.
CROWDED CROWDS: ATTENDANCE RECORDS CRUMBLE
After opening the season with a record crowd of 42,075 vs. Wisconsin, which marked the most fans ever to attend a team sporting event in the state of Nevada, UNLV easily broke its two-decade-old home attendance record this fall. The 165,493 fans in six dates were the most for any season overall and the average of 27,582 was nearly 3,000 better per game than the former mark set in 1981. Under John Robinson, UNLV has averaged at least 20,000 in all four seasons after having hit that mark only twice in the previous 17 years.
UNLV ATTENDANCE RECORDS SET DURING 2002 SEASON
SINGLE GAME OLD MARK42,075 40,091 (1996)TOTAL FANS165,493 159,645 (1979)PER-GAME AVERAGE27,582 24,799 (1981)
FULFILLED TO THE BRIMMER
UNLV football standout Jamaal Brimmer was named 2002 Mountain West Conference Defensive Player of the Year by three outlets. The sophomore strong safety from Las Vegas was named first team All-MWC and the league's defensive MVP by both The Sporting News and College Football News after earlier being named the official league player of the year on his side of the ball. Brimmer is only the third Rebel to ever win such an honor but the second straight as All-American cornerback Kevin Thomas, now of the Buffalo Bills, won last year's defensive award. Brimmer (6-1, 205) exploded on to the scene in his second season, starting every game and leading the MWC with 17 tackles for loss (for -62 yards). He finished ninth in the league with 8.3 tackles per game (100 total tackles) and led UNLV and tied for fifth in the MWC with 5.5 quarterback sacks. Brimmer also tied for second in the league with three forced fumbles and led the Rebels in pass breakups with six.
SENIORS DOMINATE SEASON AWARDS
Three Rebel seniors earned MVP honors as the UNLV football awards were announced as part of the team's annual postseason banquet December 6 at the Four Seasons Hotel. With the voting done by their teammates, running back Joe Haro and quarterback Jason Thomas were named UNLV Co-Offensive Most Valuable Players. Haro, out of Clifton, N.J., rushed for 813 yards and five touchdowns and became the fourth player in school history to reach 2,000 yards in a career (2,013) after posting four of his nine career 100-yard games this fall. His 5.3 yards-per-carry average was tops among the leading six rushers in the league. After also winning the award in 2001, Haro is the fourth repeat winner in school history. Thomas, a former USC transfer out of Compton, Calif., was a preseason member of the Davey O'Brien Award and Johnny Unitas Award watch lists and finished fifth at the school in career passing with 4,997 yards, second in total offense with 6,525 yards and third in rushing touchdowns with 24. He was named Mountain West Conference Player of the Week on November 4 after passing for a career-high 329 yards and rushing for a school-record three touchdowns in a single quarter during a 49-48 overtime win over Wyoming. Former Iowa State transfer Tyrone Tucker made the most of his one season in Las Vegas and was tabbed UNLV Defensive MVP. The linebacker out of Miami, Fla., finished second on the team and third in the MWC with 9.0 tackles per game (108 overall). He ranked second for UNLV and eighth in the league with 4.5 quarterback sacks, finished third in the league with 14 tackles for loss and was named conference player of the week on October 7 after leading his team to a win over UNR. A special teams player of the year was not named this season. Other honors handed out included tight end DeJhown Mandley receiving the Rene Arceneaux Scholarship Award, which is given to a player who has demonstrated exemplary improvement in academic progress, while senior safety Connie Brown won the Robert Cline Scholarship Award. Both honors are worth $2,000 toward assisting the players in completing their degrees. The Bill "Wildcat" Morris Most Inspirational Award, which is voted on by Rebel players, again went to offensive lineman Tony Terrell - the only two-time winner in history. Terrell also earned the "Doc" Tobler Senior Award, which is given to the final-year player who brings the highest credit to himself and the university. Senior offensive lineman Eddie Freas picked up the Jack Gilmore Coaches Award, which is given to a former walk-on player who excelled on the field. The three permanent captains, who were voted on by their teammates before the final game of the season, were Haro, Terrell and Tucker. Wide receiver and Las Vegas native Toby Smeltzer was named the team's scholar-athlete of the year while Haro also was named the John Robinson Man of the Year, which is an award in its third year and is given to the student-athlete who possesses the highest integrity while aspiring for excellence.
REBEL FOURSOME EARNS ALL-STAR GAME BIDS
Jason Thomas, a three-year starter at quarterback for the Rebels, was named to the East-West Shrine Game's West roster as an Athlete. His invite to the prestigious postseason event on Jan. 11 marked the third consecutive season that a Rebel appeared in the San Francisco game and the eighth overall, which is more than any all-star game. Also, RB Joe Haro, DB Jamal Wynn and OL Keith Kincaid accepted invitations to compete in the second annual Paradise Bowl in St. George, Utah, playing for the West Team on Jan. 25.
MOORE POWER TO HIM
UNLV defensive end Leon Moore was named a member of The Sporting News 2002 Freshman All-American Teams. Moore, a 6-5, 255-pound, 2001 graduate of Rancho High School in Las Vegas, played in all 12 games and finished ninth on the team with 39 total tackles. He ranked third on the squad in tackles for loss with 11 for minus 37 yards and tied for fourth with three quarterback sacks. He also blocked one kick and added a pass breakup and a forced fumble for the Rebels. Just like UNLV kick returner Dominique Dorsey in 2001, Moore was named to the publication's freshman All-America fourth team. Moore was joined by four other rookies from the Mountain West Conference: second-team offensive lineman Albert Bimper of Colorado State, and a trio of third-teamers:, receiver Jovon Bouknight of Wyoming, offensive lineman Mike Brisiel of CSU and punter Tyler Gaus of New Mexico.
REBELATIONS
ON THE OFFENSIVE: QB Jason Thomas needed just three yards to become only the fifth man at the school to reach 5,000 yards passing in a career (4,997) but missed the final game of his collegiate career because of a foot injury ... JT still finished in fifth place on UNLV's career yardage list, just 98 short of Glenn Carano (5,095) in fourth ... Thomas, who finished second in school history with 6,525 yards of total offense, is the only Rebel signal-caller to rush for more than 1,000 yards in a career with 1,528, which ranked him 15th among all players ... Thomas also finished in third with 24 career rushing touchdowns, which was tops for any Rebel QB ... Senior Doak Walker Award candidate "Jersey" Joe Haro rushed for 126 yards on just 14 carries in his finale at CSU, which made him only the fourth Rebel to ever reach 2,000 career yards on the ground (2,013) ... Haro's century-mark day moved him into a tie for fourth place at the school with nine career 100-yard games ... Haro's total of 1,948 yards over his last two seasons ranks second all-time at UNLV, trailing only national rushing king Mike Thomas' 3,149 in 1973-74 when the Rebels were competing in a lower division ... Despite only running the ball once (for a 16-yard TD) in the season finale, spot rusher Dominique Dorsey (who ranked ninth in rushing in the MWC at 47 YPG) rolled up 292 yards on just 28 combined carries in the last four games and sported a 7.3-yards per-carry average in '02, which by far led the conference. Next best among the top 10 was teammate Larry Croom at 7.2 ... After a dreadful year in 2001 that saw Michael Johnson lead the team with just 25 catches, the Rebel receivers emerged in the second half of the season. In the last nine games, UNLV had six 100-yard receiving efforts from four different players (Earvin Johnson three times, Larry Croom, M. Johnson and Steven Costa, who became the first Rebel fullback to ever make the century mark through the air when he picked up 102 on five grabs vs. Wyoming) ... Of that foursome, all but Costa return in 2003 ... The season totals of E. Johnson (51 catches), M. Johnson (42), and Croom (20) marked the first time UNLV had three players with at least 20 receptions since 1997 ... MJ will head into 2003 having caught at least one pass in 20 consecutive games while EJ is right behind at 19 ... EJ turned in a career day in the season finale with 12 catches, which tied for second most in school history, to go along with 132 yards and two scores.
FOR THE DEFENSE: Linebacker Adam Seward, who is the son of former UNLV assistant coach Tom Seward (1986-89), finished fourth in tackles as a freshman two years ago with 60. After moving to the middle spot this season, he led the MWC with 11.1 takedowns per game and hit double figures in nine of 12 games, including a career-high 16 at Utah ... For the first time in school history, four Rebels hit the century mark for total tackles in 2002: Seward, fellow-LB Tyrone Tucker (who ranked third in the league with 108), and safeties Connie Brown (104) and Brimmer (100) ... UNLV's leading sack man this year was an unlikely candidate, Brimmer, who stood fifth in the MWC with 5.5 QB takedowns and was first with 17 TFL ... The Rebel defense had to overcome the loss of a school-record four players taken in the 2002 NFL Draft (All-American cornerback Kevin Thomas, safety Sam Brandon, and defensive linemen Anton Palepoi and Ahmad Miller) after having only three defenders picked in the previous 16 years ... LB Ryan Claridge, who was the team's leading returning tackler (71) and ranking second in the nation with six forced fumbles in 2001, never mdae it on to the field in 2002. Claridge suffered from a sports hernia and did not practice during spring or preseason camp and decided to redshirt and have two years of eligibility remaining.
SPECIAL (TEAMS) DELIVERY: Punter Gary Cook's overall average was down slightly this season at 38.3 but the sophomore dropped 26 of his 70 punts inside the opponents' 20-yard line, including 20 of his last 46 ... Veteran place-kicker Dillon Pieffer, who also took over kickoff duties in 2002, fell just short of becoming the first Rebel to complete a season perfect in extra-point attempts since Jim Cook hit all 16 of his in 1988. Including sitting at 33-33 this season, Pieffer had just tied Cook's school record for consecutive PATs with 45 when his final attempt of the year was blocked with under a minute remaining in the Colorado State victory. Despite the ironic snafu, Pieffer teamed with long-snapper Joe Eddleman and holder Toby Smeltzer to solve a problem area for a program that had missed 13 PAT attempts from 1999-2001.
