Wednesday, April 7, 2010 | 11:30 p.m.
In the dot-com era, it's never too soon for the national media to start chiming in on preseason Top 25 opinions.
Wednesday, a couple of the national scribes showed UNLV a little love when drawing up some über-premature polls for the 2010-11 season.
By the way, the 2010-11 season won't tip off for more than seven months. Just sayin'.
Gary Parrish from cbssports.com ranked the Rebels 19th on his list, while Jeff Goodman from foxsports.com listed Lon Kruger's club 25th.
The Rebels were 25-9 this season, advanced to the Mountain West Conference tournament title game and earned their third berth in the NCAA tournament in the last four seasons.
What appeared to earn the mention from the likes of Parrish and Goodman is the fact that UNLV returns nine members of its 11-man rotation from this season, with the only losses being reserves Darris Santee and Steve Jones.
OK, now there were some minor flaws. Goodman called Brice Massamba "Bruce," while Parrish tagged Chace Stanback as "Stanbeck." Plus, both referred to UNLV's key newcomer as Henry Buckley, while the 6-foot-11 shot-blocker still is attempting to qualify academically and, if he does so, more than likely will redshirt next season.
Also, both left out mentioning the potential impact that will be made by 6-foot-8 Kansas transfer Quintrell Thomas and 6-foot-11 redshirt freshman Carlos Lopez.
The potential X-factor is the possibility of Cory Joseph or Dwayne Polee committing and filling UNLV's final available scholarship for next season.
But that's just nit-picking.
Point is, they've got UNLV pegged pretty correctly, as expectations will be higher in 2010-11 than they have been entering any season in the previous six seasons under Lon Kruger.
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