Rutledge leads Rebels with 19 in Aussie victory

Friday, June 27, 2008 | 7:54 a.m.

(Filed at 11:53 p.m. Friday, June 27, Sydney time.)

UNLV evened its Australian-tour record at 1-1 on Friday with a 77-75 victory over the Illawarra Seahawks at the Snakepit two hours outside Sydney in Wollongong.

Senior guard Mareceo Rutledge led all scorers with 19 points and he grabbed eight rebounds. The lefty from Sacramento, Calif., has scored a team-best 32 points in the Rebels’ two games.

"We came out with more urgency tonight," Rutledge said. "We needed to be more aware and more aggressive than we were in our first game, and we were."

Senior guard Wink Adams sank a pair of free throws in the final 15 seconds to give UNLV its two-point edge, and Illawara missed a shot at the buzzer. The Rebels led 75-69 with 24 seconds left.

New point guard Tre’Von Willis, who will be a sophomore in 2008-09 after transferring from Memphis, tallied 17 points, which included a run of 10 in a row for the Rebels. Joe Darger chipped in with 11. Senior swingman Rene Rougeau had a game-high nine rebounds.

UNLV traveled to Australia with eight healthy players, and for the second consecutive game all eight saw action.

"We had an extra night of sleep and our bodies were more used to this tonight," said Adams. "We are just trying to get better and better, and tonight we came out, took the lead early and continued to hit our shots."

UNLV continues its adventure Saturday with a game against the West Sydney Razorbacks. On Sunday, the Rebels fly to Brisbane for games Monday and Tuesday.