By John Antonik for MSNsportsNET.com
March 18, 2005
UPDATED TOURNAMENT NOTES
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia advances to the second round of the NCAA tournament for the first time since the 1998 season and just the eighth time in school history. The other times were in 1959, 1960, 1963, 1982, 1984, 1989 and 1998.
The Mountaineers now have a 14-18 all-time mark in NCAA tournament play, and WVU coach John Beilein collected his 500th victory as a collegiate coach against Creighton Thursday night.
Beilein’s record at West Virginia now stands at 53-39.
More NCAA Notes:
West Virginia will be facing Wake Forest (27-5) for the 10th time ever on Saturday night. The Mountaineers own a 6-3 record against the Demon Deacons and last met on Dec. 3, 1975 in Winston-Salem, N.C., when Wake won 93-80.
Skip Brown scored 26 points and Rod Griffin contributed 24 in the Wake victory. Stan Boskovich led West Virginia with 24 points. The coaches in that game were Joedy Gardner for West Virginia University and Carl Tacy for Wake Forest.
West Virginia is 2-0 all-time against Wake Forest on neutral courts including a 101-99 victory over the Demon Deacons in Charleston during Wake’s Final Four run.
Wake Forest coach Skip Prosser has a West Virginia University connection, having earned his master’s degree from WVU in 1980 while serving as a successful high school coach at Wheeling Central.
Prosser has constructed one of the most successful basketball programs in the ACC, having won 35 regular season ACC games over the last three seasons and averaging 23.5 wins per year during his four seasons. Prosser’s 94 wins over a four-year span is the second-best period in Wake Forest history. Wake is making its fifth straight NCAA tournament appearance.
This year is Prosser’s ninth NCAA tournament appearance as a collegiate coach guiding three different teams to the Big Dance: Loyola (Md.), Xavier and Wake Forest. He is one of just 11 active coaches to lead three different teams into NCAA play.
Wake Forest’s 27 victories are a school record, topping Dave Odom’s 1996 team which compiled 26 victories. The Demon Deacons are making their 20th all-time NCAA tournament appearance and own a 27-19 record in tournament play. Wake has been to one Final Four in 1962 under Len Chappell and Billy Packer and has made it to the Elite Eight six times, most recently in 1996.
This season marks the third time Wake Forest has been a No. 2 seed in the NCAA tournament. The Demon Deacons have never been seeded lower than ninth.
Wake Forest has had trouble in the past against Big East teams, having posted just a 14-26 all-time record against the Big East. Wake’s last NCAA tournament game against a Big East team in 1981 resulted in a first-round loss to Boston College.
Prosser has never coached against West Virginia but he has gone up against Mountaineer coach John Beilein once while Beilein was at Richmond and Prosser was at Wake Forest. Prosser won the head-to-head match up.
West Virginia has a positive recent history against No. 2 seeds, having upset No. 2-seeded Cincinnati in the 1998 tournament in Boise, Idaho, to advance to the “Sweet 16.”
No. 5-rated Wake Forest becomes the 12th nationally ranked team West Virginia has faced this year. The Mountaineers are 6-5 against ranked teams, representing the most wins over ranked teams in a single season in school history. The Mountaineers have also faced their toughest slate ever by playing 12 ranked teams. The previous high was eight ranked teams faced during the 2001 season.
Nearly 25 percent of John Beilein’s 92 games at West Virginia so far have been against nationally ranked teams – by far the most difficult slate ever encountered by a WVU basketball coach.
West Virginia has one top-10 win this year defeating No. 7 Boston College in the quarterfinal round of the Big East tournament last week. It was the highest ranked team the Mountaineers have defeated since topping No. 6 Connecticut at the WVU Coliseum in 1998. The last time West Virginia downed a top five team was on Feb. 24, 1987 when the Mountaineers upset No. 5 Temple 64-61 in Philadelphia.
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Kevin Pittsnogle scored his 1,000th career point Thursday night against Creighton. He is now 36th on the school's all-time win list.
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Junior Kevin Pittsnogle became the 42nd player in school history to pass the 1,000-point mark against Creighton and now shows 1,016 for his career, ranking him 40th. Senior Tyrone Sally is now in 36th position on the school scoring list with 1,059 after scoring 12 against Creighton.
Even though West Virginia failed to make 10 threes against Creighton it made eight), the Mountaineers are 14-1 this year when making 10 or more threes in a game. West Virginia did shoot 40 percent from three-point range against the Blue Jays and are now 13-0 when shooting 40 percent or better from behind the arc.
Joe Herber has moved into 11th place in career assists with 313, passing All-American Rod Thorn who had 304 from 1961-63. J.D. Collins is tied for 16th place along with Tim Lyles with 263.
How about the emergence of Frank Young. The sophomore made all three of his field goal attempts against Creighton for eight points and has now scored 42 of his 99 points this season in post-season play. Young is 15 of 28 from the floor including nine of 17 from three for 42 points in his last four games against Boston College, Villanova, Syracuse and Creighton.
In J.D. Collins’ last three games he has matched his career high for points scored (10 versus Villanova) and assists (seven against Creighton). In five post-season games Collins is averaging 6.4 points and 5.6 rebounds per game. He is also shooting 55.5 percent (10 of 18) from the field including 54.5 percent from three (six of 11). Collins has a 28 to eight assist-to-turnover ratio in post-season play.
Tyrone Sally’s breakaway basket to beat Creighton was reminiscent of another Mountaineer down-to-the-wire NCAA tournament victory 21 years ago when J.J. Crawl stole an inbound pass and drove the length of the floor for the winning bucket against Oregon State in a 1984 NCAA first round game.
Much has been made in New York and now in the NCAA tournament about West Virginia’s lack of experience and athleticism. One veteran scribe even went as far as to liken the Mountaineers to a rec team. But consider this: both Joe Herber and Kevin Pittsnogle have compiled a pretty impressive resume of international playing experience.
Pittsnogle was a member of Team USA’s Junior National Team that led USA to a 5-0 record at the Global Games in Dallas and was the team’s leading scorer (12.6 ppg.) despite coming off the bench. He then helped USA to a 7-1 record at the Junior World Championships in Greece, scoring 17 in the team’s final game against Puerto Rico.
Herber played in the 2003 World University Games for his native Germany and was a member of the German National Team alongside NBA star Dirk Nowitzki last year that competed for the European Championships. Herber is expected to play with Germany in the 2008 Olympic Games.
Another strong contingent of Mountaineer fans is expected for Saturday’s game against Wake Forest. Ingenious West Virginia supporters managed to purchase tickets from the other schools at the site. Yesterday’s line for Tennessee-Chattanooga will call window was reportedly littered with Mountaineer fans.
West Virginia University Deputy Director of Athletics Mike Parsons says West Virginia University was well represented inside the Wolstein Center Thursday night.
“We outnumbered everyone else in sheer numbers because of Chattanooga,” Parsons said. “I also think a lot of the locals were supporting Mike Gansey.”
According to Parsons, tickets for the second round game have already been pre-sold to the four teams making up the two games Saturday evening. “Even though there were eight teams there are now only four teams in one session so there are not additional tickets,” Parsons said.
Those following Saturday's game on satellite radio can access the contest on Sirius channel 127.
Cleveland Cavaliers star LeBron James was at Thursday night’s game. He is reportedly a friend of the Gansey family.
