ESPN Classic LIVE
January 04, 2005 02:56 PM | General
January 4, 2005
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ESPN Classic LIVE
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Pull out your leisure suits and your plaid jackets because ESPN Classic is taking you back to 1979. West Virginia’s Big East opener at Villanova is the network’s first live sports broadcast as part of its LIVE Turn Back the Clock college basketball game of the week. The WVU-Villanova game begins a nine-week run of live college basketball games on Wednesday night, aimed at recreating a telecast and game environment similar to 1979 – ESPN’s first year of existence. Jim Simpson and former Villanova coach Rollie Massimino will handle the broadcast. ESPN Classic plans to supplement each live broadcast with drop-ins of significant moments in each school’s history and other historically related events of the past. For Wednesday’s game, Villanova is encouraging fans in attendance to dress as if it were 1979. The Wildcats that year won 15 of 28 games after advancing to the NCAA tournament Elite Eight in 1978. Villanova, coached by Massimino, featured a starting lineup consisting of Alex Bradley, Marty Caron, Aaron Howard, Tom Sienkiewicz and Rory Sparrow. West Virginia, meanwhile, was in its first season under new head coach Gale Catlett. The Mountaineers posted a 16-12 record and finished second in the Eastern 8. West Virginia had a starting lineup consisting of Dennis Hosey, Junius Lewis, Lowes Moore, Joe Frycz and Vic Herbert. The Mountaineers lost their only meeting against Villanova in 1979 at the Palestra, 99-58. Bradley scored 27 points and grabbed 11 rebounds for the Wildcats, which shot a torrid 41 of 63 from the floor for 65.1 percent. |
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia, nationally ranked for the first time in seven years, will get a heavy dose of reality Wednesday night facing 7-1 Villanova in a Big East opener for both teams.
“How jacked up will they be in there?” said West Virginia coach John Beilein. “An undefeated team coming in there and it’s another thing that we have to go through to continue to make the right steps.”
West Virginia is in the midst of a tough stretch facing three games in a span of six days. Ahead of Villanova, West Virginia takes on St. John’s at the Coliseum Saturday and then Marshall on Tuesday night in Charleston.
“We have an interesting stretch where we have a two-day prep for Villanova, a two-day prep for St. John’s and a two-day prep for Marshall,” said Beilein. “That’s three games in six days so it will be a very difficult week.”
The No. 21 Mountaineers, 10-0 for the first time since 1959-60, are coming off back to back wins against nationally ranked teams for the first time since March, 1998. WVU downed George Washington 71-65 last Wednesday at the Coliseum and went on the road to beat North Carolina State 82-69.
West Virginia got 15 points and 10 rebounds from forward Mike Gansey and had six players reach double figurers against the No. 17-rated Waolfpack, minus star forward Julius Hodge who sat out the game with a sprained ankle.
But West Virginia is facing a healthy and well rested Villanova team, having last played on Friday, Dec. 31, against Penn.
Villanova shows wins over UMBC, Monmouth, LaSalle, Fordham, Albany, Middle Tennessee State and Penn with its only loss coming in a Big Five game to Temple, 53-52, on Dec. 4.
Coach Jay Wright is using a starting lineup consisting of 6-foot-7 Curtis Sumpter and 6-foot-8 Will Sheridan at forwards with 6-foot-3 Randy Foye, 6-foot-2 Allan Ray and 6-foot-1 Mike Nardi starting in the backcourt.
Sumpter is Villanova’s big gun, averaging 18 points and nine rebounds per game. The preseason second-team all-Big East pick is coming off his third double-double of the season against Penn and shows six double-doubles in three seasons at Villanova. Sumpter has also expanded his game beyond the three-point line this year, making 13 threes so far this year and shooting 41.9 percent from behind the three-point line.
Allan Ray remains Villanova’s top outside scoring threat averaging 14.9 points per game and shooting 41.9 percent from three-point distance. Ray has made a team-best 18 threes and burned West Virginia for 20 points in a 73-58 Wildcat win at Villanova last year.
Foye joins Sumpter and Ray in double figures with an average of 13.9 points per game. Foye has taken the most shots for Villanova this year (106) and ranks second on the team with 15 threes.
Villanova’s top sub is 6-foot-9 junior center Jason Fraser, an often injured talent who has spent as much time on the sidelines as he has on the floor. Fraser has played in all eight games so far this year, starting two, and is averaging 6.8 points and 5.5 rebounds per game.
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| West Virginia's D'or Fischer is averaging 9.7 points and 4.7 rebounds per game. He is making a return to his hometown of Philadelphia for the Villanova game.
All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks photo |
Villanova has been formidable on the glass, out-rebounding its opponents by an average of nearly 13 per game. The Wildcats trail just Connecticut as the top rebounding team in the Big East.
“They’re getting 40 a game in low scoring games as well,” said Beilein. “We’re not going to get as many second shots and our real key will be not to give them more than five or six of those. That’s going to be very difficult for us to keep that from happening.”
The West Virginia-Villanova series has been a competitive one of late with West Virginia taking three of the last five and Villanova owning an overall record of 18-14 against the Mountaineers. West Virginia last won at The Pavilion in 2003, downing the Wildcats 91-83 in an exciting up and down game.
