Mike Dunlap a longshot for UNLV Rebels coaching job

This blog has been tracking the moves of various coaching jobs around the country to see which of the St. John's Red Storm's veteran assistants names comes up seriously for a head coaching position. This time around, Tony Chiles' name hasn't rung out, but Mike Dunlap's has - for various western non-BCS-level positions.

This is no small deal; Dunlap's on-court teaching and drills were a big part of the Red Storm's dramatic turnaround this past season.

In the past weeks, Wyoming had a look at Mike Dunlap. Fresno State seemed interested... but never called. Perhaps Dunlap's pay grade was over their financial means. So what's going on with the Nevada Las-Vegas search? A decision is coming... read about it below the fold.

Last week, Mike Dunlap has interviewed with Nevada-Las Vegas, the Mountain West program famous for Jim Tarkanian aka Tark the Shark, for high-level basketball and scandals, and more recently for being very competitive under Lon Kruger... who left to take the University of Oklahoma coaching job.

But UNLV seems to have settled on two main candidates, and neither of them is Mike Dunlap. Both Brigham Young's Dave Rice and current Minnesota Timberwolves assistant Reggie Theus have been told to be available for an introductory press conference on Monday. One assumes that UNLV Athletic Director Jim Livengood is flipping a coin going through the qualifications one last time, checking with his board and the boosters, possibly hammering out the final contract parameters, if not the actual contract terms.

It would be nice for Mike Dunlap to get a crack at one of these job; these are solid jobs out west with some fan and booster support in solid conferences. But it's good for the Red Storm, whose green freshmen, two sophomores, and junior need all the coaching they can get as they develop into a force in the Big East.