2017 Mountain West Baseball Preseason Poll/Team Announcement

LAS VEGAS (UNLVRebels.com) - The UNLV baseball team was picked to finish in a tie for fifth place in the 2017 Mountain West Preseason Poll, which was voted on by the Conference's seven head coaches and announced Wednesday. In addition, Rebel sophomore Kyle Isbel was chosen to the MW's Preseason All-Conference Team.

Isbel was named to Collegiate Baseball's 2016 Louisville Slugger Freshman All-American Team and claimed a share of the MW Freshman of the Year award that went along with All-MW Second Team honors.

The native of Fontana, California, played in all 56 games as a freshman with 55 starts at third base; however, he's making a switch to the outfield this season. Last year, he led the team in at-bats (232), runs (38), triples (eight) and total bases (103). He was second in batting average (.319), hits (74), RBI (28) and slugging percentage (.444). He scattered at least one hit in 43 outings and had two or more hits in 20 of those affairs.

UNLV returns six starting positional players and a total of 22 letterwinners from a year ago that won 24 games, eight of which came against five teams that competed in the NCAA Tournament. Included in the returners is 2016 All-MW First Team performer Payton Squier as well as fellow upperclassmen Justin Jones, Cody Howard, Austin Anderson, Nick Rodriguez and Cooper Esmay.

The Rebels open their 2017 baseball season at home with nine straight home games that run from February 17 through March 1. Kicking off this lengthy stretch is the UNLV Classic (February 17-19), a three-day tournament at Earl E. Wilson Stadium that will welcome the Omaha Mavericks, Saint Mary's Gaels and UC Davis Aggies to Las Vegas.

UNLV will host Omaha, once more, in an afternoon matinee on February 20 as well as three versus the Cal State Fullerton Titans (February 24-26) and a pair against the UC Riverside Highlanders (February 28-March 1).

The first 500 fans through the gate on opening night (February 17) will receive a free Rebel baseball hat courtesy of the Southern Nevada Sports Hall of Fame.

In all, the Rebels will play a total of 30 home contests and fans can get season tickets for $90 while mini plans and single-season tickets are all available at UNLVTickets.com.

The New Mexico Lobos and Fresno State Bulldogs were predicted to finish first and second in this year's standings, and the pair were only separated by one point and one first-place vote. New Mexico, the 2016 MW Tournament champion, took in 34 points and four first-place votes while Fresno State, the 2016 MW regular-season champ, had 33 points and three votes.

The Nevada, Reno Wolf Pack and San Diego State Aztecs were third and fourth, respectively. The former edged the latter out by two points (23-21). UNLV and Air Force followed in fifth while San Jose State was seventh (six points).