Men's Basketball: WVU Faces Alcorn St. Thursday
November 16, 2011 10:33 AM | General
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - Bob Huggins gets back into the laboratory for a day of work on Wednesday before his team returns to the court to face Alcorn State Thursday night at the Coliseum.
West Virginia (1-1) dropped a 70-60 decision to Kent State Tuesday morning in a game that was televised on ESPN as part of the network’s 24 hours of college basketball.
The Mountaineers had a five point lead at halftime before the Golden Flashes went on a 19-4 run early in the second half to take control of the game.
West Virginia shot just 36.8 percent from the floor, but it was the Mountaineers’ inability to handle the basketball that led to Kent State’s big run. So far this season West Virginia’s backcourt players have struggled with pressure, turning the ball over 38 times in games against Oral Roberts and Kent State.
This is the first time turnovers have been a real issue for the Mountaineers since 2002 when they averaged 17.5 turnovers per game on the way to an 8-20 record. Since then, West Virginia’s worst season handling the basketball was in 2003 when it averaged 13 turnovers per game.
Last year under Huggins, the Mountaineers turned the ball over only 8.8 times per game. In fact, all four of Huggins’ WVU teams have been exceptional at keeping the basketball.
After the Oral Roberts game Huggins was upset with the rebounding disparity and he made it a point in practice to get that fixed. His players got the message, turning a minus-13 disparity against Oral Roberts into a plus-15 advantage against Kent State.
Now he’s got to fix his team’s ball handling.
“I told you last week that I can’t just fix everything at once,” Huggins said. “I told you I would fix the rebounding, and I put a much greater emphasis on rebounding the basketball. We outrebounded them 46 to 31, and that’s a good team and they have good athletes.
“Turnovers are a little harder to fix.”
On Thursday West Virginia is facing an Alcorn State team from the Southwestern Athletic Conference that has yet to play a regular season game. The Braves are starting over with new coach Luther Riley, replacing former Alcorn State star player Larry Smith, who won just six of 59 games during his two seasons at the helm.
Riley won four high school state titles while coaching at Provine (Miss.) High and inherits an Alcorn team that won just four games last year and had one of the worst defenses in the country allowing an average of 80.6 points per game.
As a result, Riley overhauled Alcorn State’s roster with 14 new players, including seven from the junior college ranks – three of them coming from Mississippi Delta Community College.
Two of those JUCO imports – 6-10 forward Chris Brand from West Texas Community College and 6-4 point guard Anthony Nieves from East Central (Miss.) Community College – were ranked among the nation’s top 150 junior college players by JUCOJunction in 2011.
Riley is also expecting immediate help from 6-foot-4 freshman wing LeAntwan Luckett, who rates as the top incoming freshman in the SWAC this year. Luckett, from Ridgeland, Miss., was rated the nation’s 77th best prospect and the No. 20 shooting guard in the country after averaging 19.9 points, 5.6 rebounds and 4.3 assists per game as a high school senior. Luckett had offers from Mississippi State, Tennessee, TCU and Colorado before choosing Alcorn.
Those newcomers will team up with the one established player on the roster in 6-foot-2 senior guard Marquiz Baker, who averaged 15.9 points and 3.4 rebounds per game last season. However, Baker shot just 33.5 percent and averaged 2.3 turnovers per game.
Alcorn’s highest victory total in the last five seasons was 11 in 2007.
Senior forward Kevin Jones leads West Virginia with averages of 17.5 points and 13 rebounds per game. Jones pulled down a game-high 18 rebounds Tuesday morning against Kent State while 6-foot-9 junior forward Deniz Kilicli added 15 boards against the Golden Flashes and shows averages of 11 points and nine boards per game.
Tip off for Thursday night’s game is 7 p.m. the contest will be televised nationally on ESPN3.
West Virginia (1-1) dropped a 70-60 decision to Kent State Tuesday morning in a game that was televised on ESPN as part of the network’s 24 hours of college basketball.
The Mountaineers had a five point lead at halftime before the Golden Flashes went on a 19-4 run early in the second half to take control of the game.
West Virginia shot just 36.8 percent from the floor, but it was the Mountaineers’ inability to handle the basketball that led to Kent State’s big run. So far this season West Virginia’s backcourt players have struggled with pressure, turning the ball over 38 times in games against Oral Roberts and Kent State.
This is the first time turnovers have been a real issue for the Mountaineers since 2002 when they averaged 17.5 turnovers per game on the way to an 8-20 record. Since then, West Virginia’s worst season handling the basketball was in 2003 when it averaged 13 turnovers per game.
Last year under Huggins, the Mountaineers turned the ball over only 8.8 times per game. In fact, all four of Huggins’ WVU teams have been exceptional at keeping the basketball.
After the Oral Roberts game Huggins was upset with the rebounding disparity and he made it a point in practice to get that fixed. His players got the message, turning a minus-13 disparity against Oral Roberts into a plus-15 advantage against Kent State.
Now he’s got to fix his team’s ball handling.
“I told you last week that I can’t just fix everything at once,” Huggins said. “I told you I would fix the rebounding, and I put a much greater emphasis on rebounding the basketball. We outrebounded them 46 to 31, and that’s a good team and they have good athletes.
“Turnovers are a little harder to fix.”
On Thursday West Virginia is facing an Alcorn State team from the Southwestern Athletic Conference that has yet to play a regular season game. The Braves are starting over with new coach Luther Riley, replacing former Alcorn State star player Larry Smith, who won just six of 59 games during his two seasons at the helm.
Riley won four high school state titles while coaching at Provine (Miss.) High and inherits an Alcorn team that won just four games last year and had one of the worst defenses in the country allowing an average of 80.6 points per game.
As a result, Riley overhauled Alcorn State’s roster with 14 new players, including seven from the junior college ranks – three of them coming from Mississippi Delta Community College.
Two of those JUCO imports – 6-10 forward Chris Brand from West Texas Community College and 6-4 point guard Anthony Nieves from East Central (Miss.) Community College – were ranked among the nation’s top 150 junior college players by JUCOJunction in 2011.
Riley is also expecting immediate help from 6-foot-4 freshman wing LeAntwan Luckett, who rates as the top incoming freshman in the SWAC this year. Luckett, from Ridgeland, Miss., was rated the nation’s 77th best prospect and the No. 20 shooting guard in the country after averaging 19.9 points, 5.6 rebounds and 4.3 assists per game as a high school senior. Luckett had offers from Mississippi State, Tennessee, TCU and Colorado before choosing Alcorn.
Those newcomers will team up with the one established player on the roster in 6-foot-2 senior guard Marquiz Baker, who averaged 15.9 points and 3.4 rebounds per game last season. However, Baker shot just 33.5 percent and averaged 2.3 turnovers per game.
Alcorn’s highest victory total in the last five seasons was 11 in 2007.
Senior forward Kevin Jones leads West Virginia with averages of 17.5 points and 13 rebounds per game. Jones pulled down a game-high 18 rebounds Tuesday morning against Kent State while 6-foot-9 junior forward Deniz Kilicli added 15 boards against the Golden Flashes and shows averages of 11 points and nine boards per game.
Tip off for Thursday night’s game is 7 p.m. the contest will be televised nationally on ESPN3.
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