WVU Travels to Texas on Saturday
January 16, 2015 09:59 AM | General
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(15-2)
(12-4)MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia returns to Texas for a Saturday evening matchup against 20th-ranked Texas in the Frank Erwin Center.
The Longhorns (12-4, 1-2) have had a week to mull over their 69-58 defeat at Oklahoma State last Saturday.
“I think it’s an advantage, but I don’t think you can simulate what we do,” said West Virginia coach Bob Huggins. “That’s the hard thing. Years ago people used to put seven guys on the floor and go against seven guys to try and simulate how we get to the ball, ball pressure and how to get to traps and making the right looks and so forth. I don’t have any idea what (Texas coach) Rick (Barnes) is doing, but I know he will come up with something good because he’s a heck of a coach.”
Against the Cowboys last Saturday, Texas shot just 34.4 percent from the floor and its touted front line of Jonathan Holmes, Connor Lammert and Cameron Ridley combined to score just 7 points on 2-of-15 shooting.
That’s notable because in recent games against Texas West Virginia has struggled to handle the Longhorns’ great size, particularly Holmes, who scored 20 and grabbed seven boards in Texas’ 66-49 victory over the Mountaineers in the Big 12 tournament last year.
Holmes and Ridley combined to score 28 and grab 13 rebounds in Texas’ 88-71 victory in Austin last year, and the Holmes-Ridley duo went for 21 and 24 in an 11-point triumph in Morgantown back on January 13, 2014.
Holmes shows averages of 11.3 points and 6.5 rebounds per game, while Ridley is averaging eight and almost five per game.
“It’s two different styles. They’re half court; they want to be half court,” said West Virginia coach Bob Huggins. “They obviously want to take advantage of their size and strength and we want to take advantage of the full court and make them play the full court.
“Hopefully we can turn them over and get some easy baskets,” Huggins added.
That’s easier said than done with sophomore guard Isaiah Taylor back in the lineup. Taylor leads Texas with an average of 12.2 points per game and is back after missing 10 games with a wrist injury in the Iowa win on November 20. He has scored 28 points in his last three games back on the court, including 11 in last week’s loss at Oklahoma State.
“Taylor is good,” said Huggins. “We tried (to speed him up) a little bit a year ago and he drove it by us. But that was a year ago. The big thing is you just can’t let them catch the ball on the run. If you let them catch the ball on the run then everybody is going to make a play.
“I think what (Taylor) presents that a lot of people don’t present is he shoots that floater as soon as he gets inside 15 feet … and he shoot it extremely well,” said Huggins. “That’s why we can’t let him get in a one-on-one or a two-on-one with our bigs.”
Jevan Felix, a familiar name to Mountaineer fans, is coming off the bench this year and is averaging 10.4 points per game. Felix has had good games against the Mountaineers in the past, including scoring a team-high 19 in an 11-point win in Morgantown, scoring 18 in last year’s victory in Austin and producing 16 in the Big 12 tournament.
Six-eleven freshman forward Myles Turner is giving Texas 11.6 points and a team-best 6.8 rebounds per game off the bench and will be another big that the Mountaineers must contend with.
Sixteenth-ranked West Virginia (15-2, 3-1) is coming off perhaps its best performance of the season on Tuesday night against 18th-ranked Oklahoma. The Mountaineers scored 86 points against a Sooner defense that was allowing just 59.4 points per game and got points from 11 different players.
West Virginia also made 16 steals and forced Oklahoma into turning the ball over 22 times. Freshman guard Jevon Carter had a terrific stat line with 18 points, seven rebounds, three assists, three steals and a block in 26 minutes of action coming off the bench.
The Mountaineers also got 11 points and three rebounds off the bench from sophomore forward Nate Adrian as the West Virginia bench at one point in the game was outscoring the entire Sooner team.
West Virginia’s strong bench performance compensated for Juwan Staten’s cold shooting night, the preseason Big 12 player of the year making just 1-of-9 from the floor and scoring a season-low 4 points against the Sooners.
Sophomore forward Devin Williams had another double-double effort with 14 points and 11 rebounds against Oklahoma to boost his season averages to 11 points and 7.9 rebounds per game. Williams has a team-best five double-doubles so far this season.
Staten continues to lead the team in scoring with an average of 15.8 points per game. Junior forward Jonathan Holton is third on the team in scoring with an average of 9.8 points per game. However, Holton has been in a little bit of a scoring slump of late, producing just 29 points in his last five games while failing to reach double figures.
West Virginia will be making its third trip to Austin where the Mountaineers are 1-1. Overall, Texas leads the series by a 5-3 count after sweeping all three games against WVU last season.
Tip off is set for 6:15 ET and the game will be televised nationally on ESPN (Dave Flemming and Fran Fraschilla).
The Mountaineer Sports Network from IMG’s radio coverage begins at 5:45 on affiliates throughout the state as well as online through leanStream and the WVU GameDay App.
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