UNLV received some good news on the injury front last week when junior linebacker Starr Fuimaono was cleared for full contact after missing most of the 2008 season with a torn ACL.

“I’m back,” the 6-foot, 210-pound junior said with a smile before heading off to a weight-lifting session at the Lied Athletic Complex. “I’m pretty excited. I’ve been away from football for a long time but I’m back now. Everything is good. I’m ready to go.”

Fuimaono suffered the knee injury midway through the second quarter of the team’s Mountain West Conference opener at Utah on Sept. 6. The Rebels were leading the eventual Sugar Bowl champs, 7-0, when Fuimaono, the key figure in many of the team’s defensive schemes, went down. Utah eventually rallied for a 42-21 victory en route to a perfect 13-0 record and No. 2 national ranking.

Fuimaono was a preseason third team all-MWC pick by Phil Steele’s magazine entering the 2008 season after an outstanding sophomore campaign that saw him garner 68 tackles in just nine games before suffering a season-ending shoulder injury. He also excelled in dropping back into pass coverage and some observers felt he was equally as valuable to UNLV’s defense that year as 2007 MWC Defensive Player of the Year Beau Bell. So his loss early after a little over five quarters of action was a big one for Mike Sanford’s linebacker-thin squad last year.

“He was a huge loss just because he’s a very fast and very physical football player,” Sanford said. “Without a question that was a huge loss for a us.”

Sanford wouldn’t go as far as to put Fuimaono in Bell’s class yet. But he made it clear he expects big things from the junior from Chula Vista, Calif.

“I don’t know if you can compete with the number of tackles that Beau Bell (126) had two years ago,” Sanford said. “But Starr Fuimaono is a very important player for us and we are extremely happy to have him back.”

REBEL NOTES: Starting defensive tackle Malo Tuamua is expected to get a cast removed from his broken right hand later this week. The 6-1, 270-pound junior from Honolulu, who should vie for all-conference honors this year, suffered the injury while moving furniture last month. “My hand got caught against the corner of the wall,” Tuamua said. “I didn’t even see a doctor for a couple of weeks. When I did they said, ‘Hey, you know you broke it, right?’ But they said it is heeling fine and put the cast on it.” Tuamua still was lifting weights despite the cast. …

If you put much credence into preseason media polls, then this could finally be the year that UNLV’s football team ends up in a bowl game for the first time since the 2000 Las Vegas Bowl.

The Rebels were picked to finish fifth — barely — in a media poll released at today’s Mountain West Conference football media day at Green Valley Ranch Hotel and Casino. UNLV also had two players — senior wide receiver Ryan Wolfe and senior linebacker Jason Beauchamp — picked to the preseason all-MWC squad.

TCU (207 points, 15 first place votes) was picked to win the title followed by BYU (190, 6), defending champ Utah (179, 3), Air Force (130) and UNLV (108), which just nudged out sixth place Colorado State (107) by one point. New Mexico (60), San Diego State (53) and Wyoming (46) rounded out the poll.

The Mountain West Conference has tie-ins with at least five bowl games this year: Maaco Las Vegas Bowl, Poinsettia Bowl, Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl, New Mexico Bowl and the Humanitarian Bowl. That number could climb to six if the MWC has a team picked for a BCS bowl game and the league has six teams eligible for post-season play.

The fifth place finish in the preseason poll is UNLV’s highest since 2002 when the Rebels were selected fourth. UNLV (5-7) finished tied for sixth in the MWC with New Mexico last year with a 2-6 league mark.

BYU quarterback Max Hall was selected as the MWC’s offensive player of the year while TCU defensive end Jerry Hughes was named defensive player of the year. TCU junior punt returner Jeremy Kerley was chosen as special teams player of the year while TCU running back Ed Wesley was tabbed as freshman of the year.

UNLV’s football media guide is due back from the printer on Friday but for those who can’t wait to get their hands on a copy you can already view it now online here http://tinyurl.com/lna8ml.

Notice the great action shot of Phillip Payne’s one-handed TD catch at Arizona State on the inside front cover. That shot by Rebel Nation photographer Louie Traub is one of the all-time great sports photos for UNLV or any other college that I’ve ever seen.

UNLV offensive line coach Keith Uperesa (left) tutors a player at summer camp.

Popular UNLV assistant coach Keith Uperesa was busy tutoring high school players on the fine art of playing the offensive line during the past four days at Mike Sanford’s annual summer camp at Rebel Park.

Not bad for someone who just six weeks earlier had undergone 7 1/2 hours of major surgery at UCLA Medical Center to combat an aggressive form of thyroid cancer.

Uperesa, who will spend most of the summer undergoing radiation treatments to further combat the illness, spent five days in the hospital following the surgery. But he was back at work at the summer camp despite having several lymph nodes and a cancerous cyst removed from his neck. The surgery left a scar that starts at the bottom of one ear and makes a half-circle around the bottom of his neck and ends at the bottom of his other ear.

“I’m feeling better every day,” Uperesa, who said the disease was detected during a routine physical in February, said. “I’ve been undergoing physical therapy to try and get the range of motion and strength back in my shoulders again. When they opened me up, there were a lot of nerves that were disrupted and had to be put back together. It affected my upper body and shoulders more than I thought it would.”

Uperesa, who will return to the hospital in early July for the first round of two radiation treatments, said he was told his cancer “was caught fairly early.” He plans to be back coaching with the Rebels by the start of the regular season.

On Wednesday the former all-WAC star for BYU and former NFL offensive lineman for the Broncos and Raiders will find himself the center of attention at Coaches Tackling Cancer Golf Tournament at Fox Hollow Golf Course in American Fork, Utah.

Former Utah State quarterback Riley Jensen, who was a junior college All-American for Uperesa at Snow College in Ephraim, Utah, in 1996, and Alema Te’o, head of the Polynesian Coaches Association, organized the tournament and a silent auction to help raise funds to help Uperesa with his medical costs.

“We’re going to give (Uperesa) a big check to help him out,” Jensen said. “The thing that is a miracle about this is that we found out about his surgery on May 1 and we’ve managed to put this thing together in just six weeks. The love and donations coming through have just been fantastic and amazing. It’s a testimony to just what a great guy Keith is.”

Uperesa’s old BYU head coach, LaVell Edwards, will be on hand as will Sanford, Utah head coach Kyle Whittingham, Washington head coach Steve Sarkisian and UCLA offensive coordinator Norm Chow. BYU head coach Bronco Mendenhall and Utah State head coach Gary Anderson also will take part after working camps and clinics that day. And a number of former NFL players with ties to Uperesa will either play in the golf tourney or attend a luau afterward.

“It’s going to be a really good thing,” Sanford said. “Keith has touched a lot of people in the state of Utah that he either played with, coached with or played under him. There are a lot of Keith Uperesa fans who are pulling for him.”

Jensen said he has also received “hundreds” of donations for a two-week silent auction that will be on the website “coachestacklingcancer.com.” That site was still not operational yet as of this afternoon however.

Further information on the golf tournament, which begins at 1 p.m. on Wednesday, or the silent auction can be obtained by contacting Jensen at Rjensen@thefansports.com or by calling 801-867-4539.

I was walking through the supermarket today when I stopped by the magazine rack and noticed that not one but two college football magazines had already made their way to the shelves.

I guess it shows your age when you remember when you were lucky to see one football magazine out by the Fourth of July. Now both Lindy’s and Sporting News are on the shelves in May with Athlon probably not far behind.

Here are a few of the highlights:

* UNLV is picked to finish fifth in the Mountain West Conference by Lindy’s and sixth by Sporting News.

* The Rebels are ranked No. 81 out of 120 Football Bowl Subdivision (formerly Division 1-A) teams by Lindy’s right behind Marshall. Nevada is No. 69 while Hawaii is No. 89. Western Kentucky comes in at No. 120.

* Lindy’s picks TCU to win the Mountain West Conference and ranks the Horned Frogs No. 14 nationally with Utah (No. 23) and BYU (No. 25) also cracking the Top 25. The Sporting News picked Utah to repeat as champions and ranked the Utes No. 19 overall ahead of BYU (No. 22) and TCU (No. 24).

* Wide receiver Ryan Wolfe and linebacker Jason Beauchamp were both first team all-MWC picks by Lindy’s with junior offensive tackle Matt Murphy a second team choice. Wolfe and Beauchamp also made the Sporting News’ all-MWC squad. That magazine didn’t pick a second team.

* Lindy’s rated Wolfe as “the most dangerous deep threat” in the MWC while The Sporting News said the 6-foot-1, 205-pound senior had the “best instincts” of any player in the MWC and acknowledged talented sophomore receiver Phillip Payne as possessing “the best hands” in the conference.

* Lindy’s ranks Wolfe as the nation’s No. 19 wide receiver right ahead of Notre Dame’s Malcom Floyd.

* The Sporting News projects just three Mountain West teams in bowl games: Utah (Poinsettia), BYU (Las Vegas again) and TCU (Armed Forces Bowl in Fort Worth). It has Nevada finishing second to Boise State in the WAC and playing in the New Mexico Bowl.

* Lindy’s projects a Florida vs. Texas matchup in the Jan. 7, 2010 BCS National Championship game at the Rose Bowl. It has USC facing Ohio State six days earlier in the Rose Bowl, Virginia Tech playing West Virginia in the Orange Bowl, LSU against Penn State in the Sugar and Oklahoma and Boise State in a Fiesta Bowl rematch. Both magazines rank Florida No. 1.

UPDATE: Came across the national edition of Athlon on Monday morning at Albertsons. Rebels are ranked No. 84 in that magazine.

Thanks to an NCAA rule which allows schools playing games at Hawaii to play a 13th game in a season, UNLV last week was able to add an attractive non-conference football game at Big East heavyweight West Virginia in 2010.

The Rebels figure to clear about $600,000 after expenses for that contest, a nice chunk of change for an athletic department looking at a potential $1 million deficit. So why don’t the Rebels hit the road for some more big paydays in the future?

Turns out UNLV’s schedule, other than one 2013 date that senior associate athletic director Jerry Koloskie is close to filling, is already booked up until 2018.

For those Rebel football followers who like to plan ahead … make that way ahead … here’s UNLV’s future non-conference football schedules through 2018:

2009: Sept. 5 vs. Sacramento State; Sept. 12 vs. Oregon State; Sept. 19 vs. Hawaii; Oct. 3 at Nevada.

2010: Sept. 4 vs. Wisconsin; Sept. 18 at Idaho; Oct. 2 vs. Nevada; Oct. 9 at West Virginia; Dec. 4 at Hawaii.

2011: at Wisconsin; at Washington State; vs. Hawaii; at Nevada.

2012: vs. Minnesota; vs. Washington State; vs. Nevada; at Hawaii.

2013: at Minnesota; vs. Arizona; at Nevada; vs. TBA.

2014: at Arizona; vs. Nevada; vs. Navy; at Hawaii.

2015: vs. UCLA; at Navy; vs. Hawaii; at Nevada.

2016: vs. Idaho; at UCLA; at Navy; vs. Nevada.

2017: at Idaho; vs. Hawaii; vs. Navy; at Nevada.

The Rebels are scheduled to play at Hawaii in 2018 and will host Nevada that year. Two other games need to be added.

UNLV also already has a home-and-home lined up with Iowa State in 2020 (at Ames) and 2021.

Nobody was happier with the news Wednesday that UNLV would be playing a football game at West Virginia next year than senior associate athletic director Jerry Koloskie, the man who along with athletic director Mike Hamrick helped to broker the $740,000 payday.

The school should clear an extra $600,000 after expenses for playing a 13th game next season, something that certainly doesn’t hurt in these extremely difficult economic times. But Koloskie (1980), as well as longtime director of athletic training Kyle Wilson (1982) and assistant athletic director for operations and facilities Erik Schwarz (1993), are all graduates of West Virginia. Hamrick, meanwhile, graduated from college a couple hours south in Huntington at Marshall.

“From the time I was six years old until I left (for Iowa State in 1980) I never missed a football game,” Koloskie, who was on hand when WVU upset eventual Heisman Trophy winner Tony Dorsett and Pitt in the annual Backyard Brawl in 1975, said. “I’ve never been to a game in the new Mountaineer Field which they built after I left. I still have a lot of friends back there and my parents live nearby in Fairmont. I’ve always wanted to go back there for a game but it has never quite worked out.”

Koloskie did get to go back to Morgantown once with UNLV as basketball trainer for Jerry Tarkanian on Feb. 27, 1983. The No. 1 rated Runnin’ Rebels, perhaps still smarting from an 86-78 loss to Leon Wood-led Cal State Fullerton three nights earlier, lost that one, 87-78.

“It will be a great time of the year to go back there,” Koloskie said of the Oct. 9 date. “The leaves should be turning and the weather will hopefully be nice. It’s going to be a lot of fun for me.”

Mountaineer Field at Milan Puskar Stadium has a reputation for being one of the rowdiest in the nation … and for good reason. Many fans begin showing up and tailgating on Friday in anticipation for the game the next day.

“I talked a friend of mine and he plans on getting there on Thursday night,” Koloskie said. “People drive in a day or two early from all over the state. Games there are a major happening. It should be fun.”

This is supposed to be time for a break for UNLV football players like Ryan Wolfe.

The 6-foot-1, 205-pound senior All-American candidate received his diploma in kinesiology earlier this month and summer conditioning drills for the Rebels don’t officially begin until June 1st. But Wolfe along with about two dozen other football players were busy pumping iron under the supervision of strength coach John Grieco at the Lied Athletic Complex when I stopped by earlier this week.

“It’s great to just get back into the swing of things,” Wolfe said between sips of a protein shake. “As Coach Cink (wide receivers coach Kris Cinkovich) says, it isn’t that hard to get back into shape if you never allow yourself to get out of shape. I’m just trying to maintain and work on some little things and kind of get these young guys going a little.”

With his degree already in hand, it would be easy for Wolfe to be back home in southern California relaxing on the beach until June 1. But the man who already holds school career receiving records for catches (209), receiving yards (2,735) and 100-yard receiving games (10) said he’d rather get a head start on his final season in a UNLV uniform.

“Being an athlete, for me at least, I get kind of stir-crazy if I don’t have too many things going on,” Wolfe said. “If I went home and just hung out on the couch all day, I’d be over it in three days and want to come back and start working out again. It’s good to find some positive things to keep your time occupied.”

Wolfe plans to start work in graduate school this summer for a degree in sports education and leadership. He says he’s working out now so he can be ready to go when the team’s official summer conditioning workouts begin in two weeks.

“It’s great to get a crash course now so you’re not struggling in June,” he said.

Wolfe also has perhaps more riding on his senior season than any other Rebel. NFLDraftScout.com currently ranks him the 25th best wide receiver prospect for the 2010 NFL Draft and ranks him as a potential 6th or 7th round pick. Of course, that can change dramatically between now and next April. Just ask former Rebel running back Frank “The Tank” Summers who wasn’t even on the NFL radar at this time last year but wound up getting drafted in the fifth round by the Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers.

“That’s so far away right now,” Wolfe said of the NFL Draft. “Right now I’m just focusing on the guys around me. I’m real happy for Frank and all the other guys I know who made it on some NFL teams but right now I’m just focused on this team.”

Put this one in the “Oops” category.

I originally reported in this blog last week that John Robinson was the first player or coach with UNLV ties to be selected to the College Football Hall of Fame, a major milestone for the still young program.

Got a note today from another Hall of Famer, former Review-Journal sports writing legend Royce Feour, a member of the Southern Nevada Hall of Fame, that Robinson was actually No. 2 in that regard.

Care to guess who No. 1 was Rebel fans? Make sure you aren’t eating anything before reading on.

The answer is UNR head coach Chris Ault, easily public enemy No. 1 for most UNLV football fans and a fellow who makes no secret of his dislike for Rebel red.

Talk about your ironies, huh?

Ault, who was enshrined in the College Hall of Fame in 2002, was a UNLV assistant in 1973-74 for Ron Meyer.

I emailed UNLV associate sports information director Mark Wallington with Royce’s news and he said the error was a simple case of omitting a single word. Robinson is the first player or HEAD coach from UNLV to be selected to the Hall of Fame.

As for Ault, the school currently doesn’t acknowledge him as a UNLV person in the Hall of Fame.

Got to love that Fremont Cannon rivalry, huh? This year’s Oct. 3 meeting in Reno can’t come soon enough for me.

Former UNLV head coach and athletic director John Robinson’s selection to the College Football Hall of Fame last week was well deserved although the fact that former Arizona State/Ohio State head coach John Cooper beat him in a year ago is still a head-scratcher to me.

Robinson’s USC and UNLV teams thrived in rivalry and bowl games. Cooper was basically run out of Columbus because his team’s always seemed to find a way to come up short against Michigan. Oh, well.

Robinson is the first player or head coach with UNLV ties to make it into the College Hall of Fame in South Bend. He certainly shouldn’t be the last.

It’s time for the 12,000 or so National Football Foundation voters to put former Rebel QB/punter Randall Cunningham in the Hall as well.

Just a few days before the announcement that Robinson had made the Hall of Fame, I was watching the NFL Network when longtime NFL executive and talent evaluator Mike Lombardi volunteered the following on Cunningham: “The best punter I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Cunningham was a two-time All-American at UNLV who led the nation in punting in 1984 with a 47.5 average. That same year he led the nation in completion percentage (62.4 percent) when he completed 207-of-332 passes for 2,628 yards and 24 touchdowns.

How many players in NCAA history have led the nation in two major categories the same season, especially two as diverse as punting and passing?

Cunningham also averaged 45.7 yards as a sophomore in 1982 and 43.5 in 1983. He passed for at least 2,545 yards in all three seasons as a starting quarterback for the Rebels. And along with BYU’s Steve Young, you could make a pretty fair argument that Cunningham, who would go on to earn NFL Player of the Year honors with the Minnesota Vikings in 1998, helped redefine the quarterback position in the early 80’s with his explosive running ability.

“No question that he and Steve Young brought about the birth of the athletic quarterback in the NFL,” UNLV head coach Mike Sanford, who went head-to-head against Cunningham during his assistant coaching days at Long Beach State, said. “Without a doubt Randall deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. I thought he was definitely a dominant football player for his era. He was a great quarterback AND a great punter. I thought that he was going to get in this year.”

It seems like a no-brainer. But then so was putting John Robinson in ahead of John Cooper. And nothing against Gino Torretta and Major Harris, the two QBs who made it into the Hall of Fame this year. But I think it’s fair to say they aren’t in Randall’s class as a quarterback … much less as a punter.

The folks at the Hall of Fame finally got it right with Robinson this year. Let’s hope next year they can fix the slight of Randall Cunningham next year.

UNLV will finally be represented in the College Football Hall of Fame in South Bend, Ind.

Former Rebels head coach and athletic director John Robinson was one of two coaches to be selected along with 16 players for the Class of 2009 during an announcement this morning in New York City. The class was picked by the National Football Foundation’s 13-member Honors Court which considers voting results from 12,000 members of the NFF.

Robinson is the first player or head coach associated with UNLV to be voted into the prestigious College Football Hall of Fame. Quarterback/punter Randall Cunningham appeared on the ballot but was not selected.

“I kind of had a clue from an anonymous source that I might get in but I still haven’t heard from anyone from the Hall of Fame,” Robinson said from his home in Carlsbad, Calif., about 45 minutes after the live announcement on ESPNEWS that he said he did not watch. “It’s a great honor.

“You start making a list of people to thank and it could go on forever. It starts with my parents and family members. I also had some really great assistant coaches that played a big part in all of this. Guys like Norv Turner, Hudson Houck, R.C. Slocum, John Jackson, Marv Goux, Gil Haskill to name a few. And of course all the players I got to coach. One of the great rewards of coaching is running into a guy who played for you who maybe was just a third stringer but tells you what an impact you had on him. That along with the interaction with all the players and coaches are more important than the wins.”

Robinson also credited his head coach at Oregon, Len Casanova, as well as legendary USC coach John McKay, who helped groom him as as assistant. Both are also members of the College Football Hall of Fame.

It’s been a good year for Robinson, long regarded as one of the truly “good guys” in the coaching profession. He also will be enshrined in USC’s Hall of Fame during a dinner on May 9.

The College Football Hall of Fame finalist ballot consisted of 76 All-America players and six elite former coaches. The 2009 class will be inducted as part of the NFF’s Annual Awards Dinner scheduled for Tuesday, Dec. 8, at New York City’s Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. The class will then be officially enshrined during ceremonies at the Hall of Fame in South Bend in the summer of 2010.

Robinson began his legendary head coaching career at the USC in 1976 stepping into the big shoes left by McKay who departed for the NFL’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers after winning four national titles. There was no drop off, however, as Robinson led the Trojans to a share of the 1978 national championship and two No. 2 rankings while also producing a pair of Heisman Trophy winners (Charles White and Marcus Allen) over a seven-year span.

After leaving to coach the NFL’s Los Angeles Rams from 1983 to 1991, he returned to USC in 1993 for five years where he led the Trojans to a Rose Bowl win over Northwestern while also producing the No. 1 pick of the 1996 NFL Draft in wide receiver Keyshawn Johnson. He finished his career at UNLV starting in 1999 when he inherited a team that had gone winless a year earlier. Two years later he coached the Rebels to a 31-14 win over Arkansas in the 2000 Las Vegas Bowl, the team’s last bowl appearance.

Robinson, who also served as UNLV’s athletic director for 17 months beginning in 2002, finished his college coaching record with a 132-77-4 record over 18 seasons. He went 8-1 in bowls, including a perfect 4-0 in the Rose Bowl, for a winning percentage (.889) that is the highest in college history among coaches with at least five appearances.

Here’s the entire list of the 2009 Hall of Fame Class.

PLAYERS
PERVIS ATKINS – HB, New Mexico State (1958-60)
TIM BROWN – WR, Notre Dame (1984-87)
CHUCK CECIL – DB, Arizona (1984-87)
ED DYAS – FB, Auburn (1958-60)
MAJOR HARRIS – QB, West Virginia (1987-89)
GORDON HUDSON – TE, Brigham Young (1980-83)
WILLIAM LEWIS* – C, Harvard (1892-93)
WOODROW LOWE – LB, Alabama (1972-75)
KEN MARGERUM – WR, Stanford (1977-80)
STEVE McMICHAEL – DT, Texas (1976-79)
CHRIS SPIELMAN – LB, Ohio State (1984-87)
LARRY STATION – LB, Iowa (1982-85)
PAT SWILLING – DE, Georgia Tech (1982-85)
GINO TORRETTA – QB, Miami (Fla.) (1989-92)
CURT WARNER – RB, Penn State (1979-82)
GRANT WISTROM – DE, Nebraska (1994-97)

COACHES
DICK MacPHERSON – 111-73-5 (.601) – Massachusetts (1971-77), Syracuse (1981-90)
JOHN ROBINSON – 132-77-4 (.629) – USC (1976-82, 1993-97), UNLV (1999-2004)

Last weekend’s NFL draft provided a special moment for UNLV’s football coaching staff when running back Frank “The Tank” Summers was selected in the fifth round by the defending Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers. That meant the Rebels had one more player picked in the 2009 draft than schools like UCLA, Washington, Stanford and Boise State and tied UNLV with Notre Dame and Miami.

Jimmy Morimoto, UNLV’s assistant recruiting coordinator, had even more reason to smile.

The Cleveland Browns in the fourth round drafted one of Morimoto’s former players from Baldwin High School in Wailuku, Hawaii, USC linebacker Kaluka Maiava, the 2009 Rose Bowl MVP.

Morimoto was defensive coordinator at Baldwin in 2004 when Maiava earned Gatorade state player of the year honors. The Bears’ defense allowed an average of just three points and 112 yards per game that year.

“He’s the first player ever drafted from Maui,” Morimoto said. “That’s huge for the island.”

Maiava will be playing linebacker alongside former UNLV star Beau Bell and also on the same defense as former Rebel corner Eric Wright.

Although Maiava is the first football player from Maui to be drafted by the NFL, the island known more for its sunny beaches and lush tourist resorts has produced two current Major League baseball stars, Shane Victorino of the Philadelphia Phillies and catcher Kurt Suzuki of the Oakland A’s.

And UNLV redshirt freshman guard offensive guard Sean Tesoro, listed as a starter for the Rebels at the end of spring practice, is another Baldwin High product who played for Morimoto.

UNLV offensive lineman Johan Asiata (6-4, 310) signed a free agent contract with the Chicago Bears today according to the team’s website.

Asiata was a two-year starter for the Rebels at both tackle and guard. He is originally from Christ Church, New Zealand.

UNLV has a connection with the Bears coaching staff. Tight ends coach Rob Boras was offensive line coach from 1999-2003 for John Robinson.

I guess there is something to the old adage that “where there’s smoke there’s fire.”

Ever since UNLV’s Pro Day in early March it appeared the Pittsburgh Steelers were the NFL team most interested in obtaining the services of Rebel running back Frank “The Tank” Summers. The Steelers sent running backs coach Kirby Wilson and two scouts to Las Vegas to work the 5-10, 241-pounder out.

But Summers said he was still surprised when the Steelers did indeed draft him late in the fifth round with the 169th pick of the draft on Sunday.

“It really hasn’t sunk in yet,” Summers said from his home in Oakland. “I couldn’t really believe it. I’m very happy.”

Summers said he didn’t recognize the phone number when his cell phone rang around 12:45.

“Then I heard that deep voice of Coach (Mike Tomlin),” Summers said. “He said ‘I have some good news and bad news for you.’ He then told me that they were going to draft me. He told me they were going to need me to run the ball in certain situations. He told me they were going to need me to block. He told me they were going to need me to play some special teams for them.”

Evidently running, blocking and playing special teams for the defending Super Bowl champions was “the bad news.”

“I was just overwhelmed and excited,” Summers said. “Obviously I feel very blessed and fortunate to be put into this opportunity. I think that I was put in the best situation possible. The Steelers are a great organization. They just won the Super Bowl, and I don’t think I could be with a better team in the world right now.”

Summers leaves Thursday for mini camp with the Steelers.

“I just want to do anything I can do to help the team,” he said. “I’m so excited. I’m looking forward to getting a Super Bowl ring of my own now.”

Running back Frank “The Tank” Summers is UNLV’s best bet to have his named called out during this weekend’s NFL Draft. The 5-foot-9, 240-pounder has personally visited four NFL teams — Pittsburgh, San Diego, San Francisco and Oakland — and says he’s been getting a handful of calls each day from NFL teams showing interest.

“It’s really been picking up lately,” Summers said from his home in Oakland where he’ll watch the draft. “About four or five teams call me each day.”

Summers said most teams are telling him that he’ll be drafted but “I’m not listening to any of that. You just have to wait and see how it goes.”

The Steelers seem to be the team that has shown the most interest in Summers, sending running backs coach Kirby Wilson and two scouts out to his Pro Day at UNLV last month. They also flew him to Pittsburgh for another day of meetings.

But Summers, who recently maxed out at 455 pounds in the bench press and was timed at 4.55 in the forty, wouldn’t bite when asked if one team had shown more interest than the others.

“No, not really,” he said. “You just never know what is going to happen. Sometimes it is the team that doesn’t talk to you before the draft that picks you.”

Summers, who attended Skyline High in Oakland, met with both the 49ers and Raiders recently. Wearing the silver and black was something he contemplated while growing up in the Bay Area.

“Their facility is just about five minutes from here,” Summers said. “I used to go to all their home games. I’ve definitely thought about that.”

He said he isn’t battling any nerves — yet — while waiting for this weekend’s draft to unfold.

“No, I’m not nervous,” he said. “I’m just trying to stay relaxed. The way I look at it is that I’ve done all that I can do. The rest is up to them now.”

UPDATE: Summers was indeed chosen by Pittsburgh on Sunday in the 5th round with the 169th pick of the draft.