Men's Basketball: WVU Drops League Opener
January 05, 2005 10:10 PM | General
January 5, 2005
VILLANOVA, Pa. – It was one of those nights for the West Virginia University men's basketball team. The Mountaineers couldn’t find the rim and Villanova couldn’t miss, capturing its Big East opener 84-46 over WVU on an ESPN Classic 1979 throwback night at The Pavilion.
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| Mike Gansey drives to the basket during Wednesday night's 84-46 West Virginia loss at Villanova.
AP photo |
The No. 21-rated Mountaineers (10-1, 0-1) were one of six remaining undefeated teams in the country before running into a Villanova buzz saw. Allan Ray scored 26 points, hitting 10 of 16 field goal attempts including five of nine from three-point range, and Mike Nardi added 18 with four threes to lead Villanova to its biggest victory of the season.
“We played a very good team and a very under-rated team because they have great quickness, they have great size and they rebound the ball probably better than anybody that we have played,” said West Virginia coach John Beilein.
Nardi’s three-point marksmanship is a good example of how things went tonight for West Virginia: Nardi came into the game making just 17.1 percent (six of 35) of his three-point tries.
Villanova led from the outset and built its advantage to double figures on a Randy Foye layup to make the score 22-12. A Tyrone Sally free throw and a Patrick Beilein three-point basket trimmed Villanova’s lead to six, 22-16, with 7:05 remaining in the half. Other than a pair of Beilein free throws with 1:34 remaining, that was all West Virginia could get on the board in the first half.
In the meantime Villanova (7-1, 1-0) went on a 14-0 run to build its lead to 20, and led the Mountaineers 38-18 at halftime.
Any hopes West Virginia had of getting back into the game were dashed at the start of the second half when Villanova used a 14-4 run to build its lead to 30, 52-22, on a Ray pull-up jumper. The Wildcats biggest lead was 41 points before Duriel Price knocked down a three-pointer just ahead of the final buzzer.
The Mountaineers lost starting point guard J.D. Collins with 7:25 remaining in the first half when he turned his ankle and Beilein also joined Collins on the bench with an ice bag on his ankle midway through the second half. John Beilein said after the game that he isn't sure the playing status of both players for Saturday's game against St. John's.
Collins’ injury forced freshman Darris Nichols to play the entire second half and he wound up scoring four points and turning the basketball over three times.
Just three different players scored for West Virginia in the first half – D’or Fischer, Sally and Beilein – and starters Joe Herber, Mike Gansey and J.D. Collins combined for just three points. Herber, Collins, Gansey, Beilein, Nichols and Kevin Pittsnogle were just three of 29 from the floor.
“I look at the stat line and I see our two starting guards with zero points and seven turnovers,” said Beilein. “Now when you only score 15 baskets you’re not going to have many assists but for those guys to turn the ball over the way they did is very uncharacteristic. We’ll look at the film and learn from it and get a little bit better from it.”
Villanova students began chanting ‘overrated’ with 4:25 still remaining on the clock.
Fischer led the Mountaineers with 14 points on five of seven shooting. Sally contributed 10.
Villanova made 30 of 56 field goal attempts and 10 of 24 from three-point range. West Virginia was only 15 of 55 from the floor for 27.2 percent. The Mountaineers were six of 29 from behind the three-point line.
“Their quickness was a big difference in the game both defensively and offensively,” said Beilein.
The Wildcats hammered West Virginia 43-26 on the backboards.
West Virginia failed to score at least 50 points in a game for the first time this year and the Mountaineers’ 46 points were the lowest since scoring 46 in an 82-46 loss at Pitt during Beilein's first season at WVU in 2003. West Virginia's 38-point loss to Villanova was also its worst in conference play under Beilein, topping a 37-point beating at Syracuse in 2003.
Villanova’s defense came into the game allowing just 54.0 points per game and permitting its opponents to shoot only 36.5 percent from the floor.
“A loss is a loss,” said Beilein. “I don’t care if we lose by one here in a heartbreaker or we lose by 40 you don’t want that to happen, but if it drives the point home on some issues, then we have to do it.
“We’ve just got to take this for what it is. It’s an ‘L’ and it doesn’t make a difference to us at all as far as where we are,” Beilein said. “If we lose by one and beat St. John’s on Saturday we still have the same record.”
The Mountaineers have to put this one behind them quickly and get ready for St. John’s Saturday afternoon at the WVU Coliseum. That contest is schedule to get underway at 2 pm.
The St. John’s game is one of three games in the next six days for West Virginia, which faces Marshall in Charleston Tuesday night.
