New UNLV football head coach Marcus Arroyo poses with UNLV President Marta Meana, left, and UNLV athletic director Desiree Reed-Francois, center, during an introductory news conference at the Fertitta Football Complex at UNLV Friday, Dec. 13, 2019.
Thursday, Dec. 19, 2019 | 2 a.m.
The UNLV football program is all out of excuses. The Rebels have consistently been one of the worst teams in America, and the only thing outnumbering the double-digit losses over the decades has been the volume of accompanying excuses.
Each successive coach and athletic director tandem could point to a bunch of reasons why the program struggled so badly, and those rationalizations have mostly been accurate—until December 13, when UNLV introduced Marcus Arroyo as the 12th head coach in program history.
Arroyo comes to UNLV from the University of Oregon with a legitimate résumé as a top offensive coach with years of experience in multiple power conferences, and during his press conference, the former Ducks offensive coordinator made it clear that he won’t offer any justifications for losing.
“My goal here is to build and develop a culture founded in accountability and toughness, and I told [the players] that last night.” Arroyo said. “Those two things are going to be at the forefront of everything we do and every decision we make.”
Arroyo’s win-or-it’s-on-us attitude is appropriate, because his hiring can be viewed as the final step in a years-long push to make UNLV football relevant. Everything that has held the program back for so long has been addressed for the 2020 season.
Some of the excuses that are no longer on the table:
Lack of leadership
The UNLV athletic department was run like a mom-and-pop operation for a long time, but that’s over now. Athletic Director Desiree Reed-Francois is the epitome of corporate efficiency, and under her watch, the days of bungled coaching searches have come to an end. With her experience running the football program at Virginia Tech, she knows what a Football Bowl Subdivision team is supposed to look like, and the Rebels now function like one at the very top.
No investment in the program
Rebels football is no longer underfunded. In the past three months, UNLV has opened a new practice facility and hired a coveted head coach, and neither came cheap. The price tag on the Fertitta Football Complex was more than $34 million, and Arroyo’s 5-year, $7.7 million contract makes him the third-highest paid coach in the Mountain West Conference. Reed-Francois also said there’s enough money left over to make Arroyo’s staff one of the highest-paid in the conference.
The Rebels aren’t operating out of a basement in a shared building anymore—they’re paying top dollar for a winning program.
Recruiting woes
Poor recruiting classes have doomed UNLV to bottom-tier status in the Mountain West, but it doesn’t have to be that way under Arroyo. He’s regarded as one of the best recruiters in the country, and his former bosses at Oklahoma State and Oregon commended his ability to bring in top talent. He’s also got a network of West Coast recruiting contacts in place and the aforementioned brand-new Fertitta complex to entice prospects.
Arroyo said the ability to recruit to the Fertitta complex was a key in convincing him to take the job. “I’ve been in a lot of places coast to coast. I’ve been in places that many would assume would be the best of the best. This is nothing short of amazing,” Arroyo said. “This is what will bring great athletes here. This is what drew me in, in many ways—the ability to bring kids here.”
If UNLV doesn’t secure one of the top three classes in the conference for 2021, there will be no way to justify that failure.
Subpar stadium
Sam Boyd Stadium was not a favorite of previous coaches and players, but it was nowhere near as bad as it was made out to be. Blaming any percentage of the program’s failures on Sam Boyd was a cop-out, but it’s a moot point now that the Rebels will be sharing Allegiant Stadium with the NFL’s Raiders from now on.
It’s a basketball town
It’s true that the fan base for UNLV football is virtually nonexistent, especially compared with that of the basketball team. But can you blame the fans? If the Rebels win under Arroyo, people will start showing up to games. That’s how sports work. And winning is something over which Arroyo will have complete control, so if fans don’t show up, he will have only himself to blame.
All the extenuating circumstances that have kept UNLV from fielding a winning football team have been resolved. The only thing left for Arroyo to do is win. If he doesn’t, there won’t be anymore excuses available.
This story appeared in Las Vegas Weekly.
