There’s no easing into the final week of the regular season. Not in this rivalry. Not with the Cannon on the line. And not with UNLV sitting one win away from a second straight double-digit win season and potentially a third straight trip to the Mountain West Championship Game.

Saturday in Reno is the finish line of everything Dan Mullen has built over the last three months: a reshaped identity, a hardened road mentality, and a roster that, as Chief Borders put it this week, “plays ruthless and loves each other for real.”

The setting is simple: 51st Battle for the Fremont Cannon. Cold night in Reno. Red paint on the line. And for UNLV (9-2, 5-2), there is no disguising what’s at stake.

UNLV has received votes in 32 of the last 33 AP/Coaches polls. A win Saturday pushes the Rebels to:

But the Cannon is always the headline.

“This one sticks with you for a year,” Mullen said Monday. “Especially when it’s neighbor-to-neighbor. Everybody in the state cares about this one.”

He also didn’t sugarcoat the reality of where UNLV is standing right now.

“We have the opportunity to continue and play for a championship,” he said. “You want to end this season in the right way, you have to win this game.”

UNLV has taken three straight in the rivalry, including the last trip to Mackay, and aims to make it four for just the third time ever (1974-77, 2000-04).

On the other sideline, Jeff Choate framed this week as everything for his program.

“This is our bowl game,” he said. “This is our opportunity to go out on a high note. There’s a pretty significant size trophy that’s at stake here.”

If there was any doubt about how differently these two programs see themselves, Choate erased it in a few sentences.

“The heck with those guys, man. They got every freaking advantage. Every advantage. It should not be that way,” he said of UNLV. “I’m paying the same taxes that Dan Mullen is. He’s paying a little bit more, right? But ultimately, that’s my thing. I got a chip on my shoulder.”

He pointed straight at the resource gap.

“I had never been in Allegiant Stadium before we played them last year. I’m like, what the hell? How’d this happen? I remember going to Sam Boyd. That was okay. I was all right with that. But that was eye-opening to me.”

Then came the line that will live on both locker room walls:

“They’re Mercedes Benz or Lamborghini or whatever. I’m good being F-150. I’m good being the Ram truck. I’m good having the old beater in the driveway. And, you know, they’ll see that when they dress in our swimming locker room and walk across the parking lot into Mackey Stadium and it’s going to look a little different than Allegiant.”

To Choate, this is the identity of the rivalry:

“To me, that’s what this rivalry represents in a lot of ways. It’s a clash of cultures… that kind of blue chip, blue versus blue collar matchup.”

Mullen’s message to his team was simpler, but just as pointed: prepare the right way, or none of the rest matters.

“We talked about it this morning. A lot to play for in the rivalry,” he said. “To do that, you have to prepare and come out with the intensity, not just on Saturday. The intensity today as soon as we step on the field to how we practice, that has to be at our highest level.”

The Rebels arrive with momentum and an identity that’s tightening at the right time.

UNLV sits 16th nationally at 36.7 points per game, powered by:

Anthony Colandrea became the first UNLV quarterback since Randall Cunningham to win four conference weekly honors, and Mullen stressed that it’s about more than just highlights.

“It’s so deserving of him,” Mullen said. “It shows the growth and maturity. He’s winning those awards in his ability to use his talents, but also play quarterback at a high level.”

“You’re not gonna put up the numbers and win the awards if you don’t execute and take care of the ball,” he added. “If you’re just out there playing recklessly, it could be a human highlight film, but you’re not gonna get the accolades.”

The change has been visible.

“I think you’ve seen throughout the season, he does make the human-highlight plays,” Mullen said. “And all of a sudden, not afraid to check it down. Not afraid to take what the defense gives you… we have double-digit players with more than 10 catches.”

The Rebels are peaking:

Chief Borders summed it up best: “The mentality changed. We found our identity. We’re set on being ruthless, competing every snap, and letting opponents know exactly what they’re getting into.”

Over the last three weeks, UNLV’s defense has allowed just 46 total points, compared to 147 over the three games prior.

Borders called it a mindset shift:

“Really just finding our identity in the defense,” he said. “Being ruthless and being competitive every play, every snap, and minimizing mental errors as a whole.”

This matchup pits UNLV’s balance and efficiency against an aggressive, havoc-chasing Reno defensive front.

UNR’s best player, by far, is edge rusher Dylan LaBarbara, who enters with:

Mullen didn’t downplay the threat:

“They’re very aggressive. They’re gonna give you a lot of different looks,” he said. “Your leading tackler is a defensive end that leads the team in tackles, tackles for loss, sacks, everything. [He] can wreak havoc.”

UNLV’s offensive line is coming off arguably its best game of the season. Left tackle Austin Boyd said the challenge is exactly what they want.

“I think we were really challenged this week because Hawai‘i had a good defense on the line, and we were challenged to protect the quarterback and win our matchups,” Boyd said. “Our offense starts with our O-line. When we play well, our offense plays really well.”

Mullen agreed: “Obviously, this week, we’re playing, I think, two of the top players in the league at defensive end… they wreak havoc. It’ll be a big challenge. They’re gonna have to match that performance.”

The Rebels will lean heavily on tempo, spacing, and misdirection to keep LaBarbara and the Pack from dictating the line of scrimmage.

If Colandrea stays clean, the matchup shifts completely in UNLV’s favor.

Reno has relied on a two-quarterback system, mixing in run-heavy packages, misdirection and trick-play looks to compensate for a passing game that has struggled all season.

Mullen’s breakdown was blunt:

“Reno’s been playing two quarterbacks really the last couple games,” he said. “Usually, one of them is lined up at quarterback, one’s lined up at receiver. You’ve got to be sound… understand the trick plays and all the different things and options that can come with it, but then be sound in our schemes. That guy’s the quarterback, this guy’s the receiver — let’s go play.”

Expect UNLV to:

Hawai‘i came into last week averaging 30+ per game, and UNLV held the Warriors to 10 points and smothered nearly every YAC opportunity.

If the defense replicates that level of tackling, Reno will have trouble sustaining drives.

Win early downs.
UNR’s entire defensive model is built on creating chaos on 2nd/3rd and long. Staying ahead of the chains neutralizes their biggest advantage and keeps LaBarbara from wrecking drives.

Don’t let emotions turn into penalties.
Rivalry. Road. Cold. Chippy.
Austin Boyd said it directly: “It’ll get chippy for sure. We just have to play smart and not let our emotions get the best of us.” UNLV is 25–1 since 2023 when leading after the third quarter, but that only works if unnecessary flags don’t derail drives.

Keep Colandrea upright.
If Colandrea gets time, he will distribute the ball to all levels of the field. Reno’s back end is vulnerable and overly aggressive when forced to cover for too long.

Control the middle eight.
UNLV has dominated games this season by closing first halves and opening second halves with scoring runs. A quick surge in the middle eight often breaks UNR’s script-heavy offense.

Start fast and silence Mackay.
Mackay is tight, loud, and emotional in this rivalry, regardless of record. A quick UNLV punch can flip the atmosphere early and turn the “bowl game” energy against Reno.

If you want to know what’s holding UNLV together late in the year, Chief Borders didn’t hesitate.

“I feel like we love each other, man,” he said. “Like, genuine. There’s times where we just have each other’s back… everybody’s on the same page.”

Boyd echoed it.

“We’ve come to grow so close as a team,” he said. “We’ve played through a lot of adversity, and that makes us grow closer as well.”

As for Mackay?

“Yeah, it’ll get chippy for sure,” Boyd said. “But it’s nothing we can’t handle. We just gotta play smart. Can’t let our emotions get the best of us. They’ll have a good atmosphere, they’ll be talking, but if we just do what we do, we’ll take care of business.”

Borders summed up where this team is heading into Saturday night:

“Not too high, not too low… we’re starting to peak at the end of the year. Put it all together so we can continue to take our steps that’s already paved.”

Every Cannon game takes on its own identity. This one carries the added weight of what UNLV can accomplish beyond the rivalry: history, momentum, and the possibility of playing for another Mountain West title.

But in Mullen’s words, it really comes down to something simpler:

“If you want to end the season the right way, you have to win this game. And that starts with the way we prepare today.”

UNLV is playing its best football of the season. Reno is going to throw the kitchen sink at the Rebels and lean fully into the underdog, blue-collar identity Choate has embraced. The Rebels have been one of the nation’s strongest road teams for two years running.

Saturday, they get their chance to keep the Cannon, and everything else, painted red.

Rivalry games live in chaos, and Mackay will bring all of it: the cold, the noise, the edge, and a UNR team treating this like its bowl game.

But UNLV walks into this matchup as the deeper, more complete team with a quarterback playing the best football of his career, a defense that has found its identity, and a locker room that genuinely believes in each other.

If the Rebels protect the football and avoid the self-inflicted mistakes that kept other games closer than they needed to be, this has the potential to tilt hard in UNLV’s favor.

UNLV 56, Reno 17

The Cannon stays red. The title chase stays alive. And UNLV sends a very loud message heading into championship weekend.