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Injury may force Nevada's Nick Fazekas to miss game Save Email Print

AP Staff Posted: 12:21 PM Jan 9, 2007 Last Updated: 12:33 PM Jan 10, 2007

RENO, Nev. (AP) - Nevada star forward Nick Fazekas has a severely sprained left ankle and is "extremely doubtful" for Thursday's game at San Jose State, Wolf Pack coach Mark Fox said Tuesday. "I've got no idea when he's going to play again," Fox said. "It is not broken, that's all I know." Fazekas, a 6-foot-11 senior who ranks second in the nation in rebounding (12.3 per game) and 17th in scoring (20.8), landed on another player's foot and left just before halftime of the No. 19 Wolf Pack's 90-86 win over Boise State on Monday night. Fox said the injury is not considered a more serious high ankle sprain, but that he was concerned because it was the same ankle Fazekas hurt in a game at Akron last month."He's played with a little bit of a ding the last couple of weeks and last night injured it fairly significantly," the coach said. "I don't know how bad it is. Obviously he's going to be on the mend for a while." "I'm not going to rule him completely out, but it's really doubtful he'll play." Fox said a writer for Sports Illustrated had been in Reno the past week working on a story on Fazekas. "So it might be the SI jinx why he got hurt," the coach joked with about 240 supporters at his monthly booster luncheon at a Reno hotel-casino. Nevada (14-1, 2-0 in the Western Athletic Conference) is off to it's best start since the 1951-52 season in a bid for its fourth straight WAC title and fourth straight trip to the NCAA tournament. Fazekas, voted a third-team All-American by The Associated Press last year, initially entered the NBA draft last spring but withdrew. He is one of only five players in WAC history to log 2,000 points and 1,000 rebounds. He had 14 points and eight rebounds Monday night when he was injured during what Fox called "a typical basketball play" before being helped off the court right before halftime. "It's an injury you have in basketball. ... It's just not one you want to happen to your All-American in the middle of January," Fox said. Fazekas returned to Nevada's bench on crutches with about seven minutes left in the game and a few minutes later, was urging Fox to put him back in. "This is a kid who made them tape him up with four minutes left," Fox said. "He took the boot off and left the boot and crutches in the hallway and went in there and got taped up. He wants to play bad but we've got to look out for his best interests." Fox said he hadn't decided if Fazekas would travel to San Jose on Thursday or on to Hawaii for a Saturday game. "He's a huge part of our team," Fox said. "We can take him off the floor, but I don't want to take away his personality and the cohesiveness of our team so I don't really want to leave him home." "I may dress him out. He's a helluva free throw shooter if you need to bring somebody off the bench." Nevada is halfway through a stretch of four games in eight days with conference road games remaining at San Jose State (1-13, 0-2) and Hawaii (9-5, 0-2). "We've got no time to cry about it," Fox said. "With a deep team we can hopefully absorb Nick's injury a little bit easier," he said. He said he hadn't decided who would start in his place, listing backup forwards David Ellis and Matt LaGrone as possibilities, but also guard Lyndale Burleson and Brandon Fields as options in a smaller lineup. Fox said it's fortunate he's been able to get some playing time for his five freshmen and other backup players during the non-conference season. "We've got to try to rally the troops and overcome Nick's injury. But we've been able to do that a couple of times this year without Nick," Fox said. Nevada led Boise State 49-40 when Fazekas went out but was able to pull out the win. The Wolf Pack also came from behind to defeat Gonzaga at Seattle on Dec. 30 after Fazekas fouled out with 5:15 to go. "Every day we practice five-on-five and one team doesn't have Nick," Fox said, "so it's not like it's something completely new to us." Send Us Your Comments

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