This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2011, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
By now you've probably heard that the Cougars downed UNLV 78-64 at the Marriott Center in front of a sellout crowd of 22,700, competing the regular-season sweep of the Rebels for the first time since 2004. Jimmer Fredette became the MWC's all-time career scoring leader in the game, scoring 29 points. He now has 2,194. SDSU's Brandon Heath was the leader, with 2,189. Fredette was just 6 for 14 from the field, but made up for it with a 16-for-16 effort from the free-throw line and seven assists. He was phenomenal, as usual. Did he gain any extra motivation from what UNLV's Tre'Von Willis said before the game, that Fredette was basically a ballhog? Well, no. I asked Fredette about it in the postgame news conference. "I didn't even hear what he said, to be honest with you. To this point, it doesn't matter. I don't even care what he says. I was just worried about our team and going out there and getting a victory. And that's what we did. We did it twice this year so far. And that's all we were worried about. We were able to play well and get a good victory. It doesn't matter at this point," he said. Later, in a hallway outside the interview room, a Las Vegas reporter asked him about it. Same answer, basically. "I didn't hear anything about it. I heard about it the last time, before the UNLV game [in Vegas]. You know, it doesn't really matter. Whatever he says doesn't matter to me. The only thing that matters to me is us going out and getting victories, winning the game and doing well. We did that both times against them this year. Hopefully we will continue to play well and get more wins."——————————— I wrote more about this in my sidebar for tomorrow's paper, but Willis seemed to purposefully avoid shaking hands (or bumping knuckles, which is what the players do nowawdays) with Fredette before the game. Outside the UNLV locker room after the game, I asked him why. "I didn't shake nobody's hand. Everybody came up to me to shake my hand. I am ready to play. I am not worried about shaking anybody's hand," he said. When it was suggested that the Rebels did a better job defending Fredette today than they did in Las Vegas, Willis replied: "It wasn't good enough." Asked about what he and Fredette were talking about with 23 seconds remaining in the game, Willis said, "it was nothing." Fredette was asked about it too, but said he didn't want to repeat it and that it was just talk between "two competitive guys." Not the most eloquent fellow, Willis said the officiating was frustrating. "Hostile environment. We kind of expect some of those [calls that went BYU's way]. It wasn't too out of the ordinary, but some of them, you know, a couple of them could have went our way, but we played the game and we lost it, so it is on our shoulders." Does Willis want to see Jimmer Fredette and BYU again in the MWC tournament? "That would be great. I mean, we lost two. It would be great to get a third one, get another chance." All for now, I'll have more from the game, and some video, posted later tonight and/or tomorrow.