UNLV comes back to beat Air Force

Air Force guard Michael Lyons came to speak to the media, sat at the end of the table and mostly turned his body away from the cameras. His eyes were red and his voice trembled with disappointment.

The closer the Falcons get to breaking through in the Mountain West, the more difficult the losses become. And this was a game, against a UNLV team that was ranked a week ago, Air Force could have won.

Todd Fletcher hit a short jumper to put the Falcons ahead 50-45 with 7:39 remaining. Then Air Force disappeared for the next 6:35. Air Force didn’t score, UNLV went on a 13-0 run, and the Rebels won 64-52 at Clune Arena on Saturday afternoon.

UNLV is 14-4 and 2-2 in Mountain West play. Air Force 10-6, 1-2 in conference, and was heartbroken to lose a game it controlled for more than 33 minutes.

“Every loss is tough,” Lyons said. “This one, you have a chance to make a big upset, and you give it away. It hurts a lot.

“We had the game. We just gave it. We just gave it to them without a fight.”

From the start, when Tom Fow got a dunk on a backdoor cut and hit a couple 3-pointers for the Falcons’ first eight points, Air Force looked ready for the upset. The Falcons led 28-23 at the half and led by as many as seven in the second half.

Offensively, the Falcons were sharp, rarely turning the ball over against the Rebels’ pressure. Defensively, Air Force played well. UNLV made 1-of-12 3-point attempts in the first half.

Then it fell apart. UNLV started to get to the lane for baskets. Air Force stopped hitting shots. Down six points with less than 3 minutes left, the Falcons drew up a play in a timeout that unfolded exactly as they drew it up, with Taylor Broekhuis at the top of the key open for 3. Broekhuis, a 35 percent 3-point shooter, missed.

That theme played out repeatedly over the final minutes. Air Force, which led the conference in free-throw percentage coming into the game, missed its last six free-throw shots to end the game.

“Some of the things we’ve been doing really well, we didn’t do well down the stretch,” Air Force coach Jeff Reynolds said.

UNLV slowly pulled away as Air Force failed to score on possession after possession. By the time Evan Washington hit a layup with 1:04 left, the game was close to over. That basket cut UNLV’s lead to six points, but the Rebels hit their free throws down the stretch to put it away.

Lyons said most of his teammates had the same sick feeling he had.

“We had them the whole game,” Lyons said. “We just let it go.”