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Big 12 Play to Begin Friday
December 29, 2016 07:46 PM | Men's Basketball
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - With the exception of Temple, which defeated West Virginia in Brooklyn, New York, and Virginia, which the Mountaineers topped in Charlottesville, the early portion of West Virginia’s schedule has been an assortment of WVU blowouts, routs and laughers.
Therefore, the question is: are the Mountaineers prepared for what they are going to face Friday afternoon in Stillwater, Oklahoma, when they take on 10-2 Oklahoma State and its first-year coach Brad Underwood?
To refresh your memory, it was Underwood who tossed a dead cat into the punch bowl and ruined West Virginia’s season last year in Brooklyn when his Stephen F. Austin team took it to WVU in the NCAA tournament.
Some thought West Virginia’s pressing style was going to give teams fits in the tournament, possibly leading to Huggins’ third trip to the Final Four.
That obviously didn’t happen.
Underwood, too, if you recall, once worked under Huggins so he has had access to the family jewels so to speak, which to Huggins, is probably more problematic than their long-standing friendship.
“I don’t think it’s friends I think it’s familiarity,” Huggins said via teleconference Friday morning. “I think Brad is very familiar with what we do and what we’re trying to accomplish having been on the same staff.”
What Underwood did in three short seasons at Stephen F. Austin is nothing short of amazing. And it has continued at Oklahoma State with an outstanding 10-2 record heading into Friday’s Big 12 opener against West Virginia.
In fact, Underwood is now just one win shy of reaching 100 for his coaching career. He has lost only 16 times.
“I just as soon rather he waited (for win No. 100),” joked Huggins. “Brad doesn’t need to get there too soon. If he gets there too soon he’s liable to get a little fat and cocky. He ought to wait a game.”
In all seriousness, this is going to be West Virginia’s most challenging game since beating then-sixth-ranked Virginia 66-57 in Charlottesville.
The Mountaineers’ five games since then have all been blowouts, the closest margin being 27 points against Radford nine days ago.
West Virginia (11-1) is outscoring its opponents by an average of 33.2 points per game, which leads the country, and the Mountaineers also continue to lead the nation in turnover margin (15.8), turnovers forced (26.3) and steals (13.9).
The Mountaineers are going to have to have all of those things working in their favor if it wants to knock off the fired-up Cowboys playing in front of what is expected to be a packed Gallagher Iba Arena.
“They’ve sold the place out with 14,000 and I think by and large most of the places we go it’s going to be that way and I think there it just so much more enthusiasm,” said Huggins. “Football is over now and basketball has kind of started in a lot of people’s minds - including a couple of our players, I think.”
Oklahoma State’s best player also happens to be one of the best players in the country in 6-foot-1-inch, 185-pound sophomore guard Jawun Evans from Dallas. He’s averaging 20.2 points, 4.6 assists and 2.5 steals while shooting an impressive 47.6 percent from the floor, including a sizzling 56 percent from 3.
Evans was having a great season last year before it ended prematurely because of injury. West Virginia didn’t face Evans in either game last season - both WVU wins.
“He’s really good,” said Huggins. “He was really good a year ago before he got hurt. I think he was right at the top of being the best guards in the league. He’s matured. He’s obviously got a year under his belt and Brad has done a great job with him. The guy knows how to score. He really doesn’t have a lot of weaknesses. He can make 3s, he can pull up and make shots and he’s terrific going at the basket.”
Obviously, the Mountaineers must be concerned with Evans and what he can do with the basketball in his hands.
Another is senior guard Phil Forte III, who is back for a fifth season. Like Evans, WVU conveniently missed facing Forte last year when the Flower Mound, Texas, resident when down with an injury following the 12th game of the season.
Forte was an all-Big 12 choice in 2015 after ranking fourth in the conference in scoring averaging 15 points per game. He has scored 1,464 career points to rank 14th in Oklahoma State history.
Six-six freshman Lindy Waters III is also a perimeter-oriented player who is averaging 7.6 points and 1.1 assists per game, giving OSU three quality backcourt players to handle the ball against WVU’s full-court press.
Six-eight senior Leyton Hammonds is OSU’s top inside threat averaging 7.4 points and 5.3 rebounds per game, while 7-footer Lucas N’Guessan doesn’t score a lot, but does block some shots ranking 14th in the conference heading into today’s game.
Meanwhile, West Virginia has eight different players averaging at least 6.8 points per game and nine different players averaging at least 11.1 minutes per game.
Sophomore forward Esa Ahmad continues to develop his game and is averaging a team-best 12.9 points per game while shooting 51.9 percent from the floor.
Senior forward Nathan Adrian ranks second on the team in scoring by averaging 10.5 points per game, but he has struggled with his shot making just 42.3 percent of his field goal attempts and only 22.2 percent of his 3-point field goal attempts.
But Adrian is easily the team’s best passer and players a vital role as the point man in WVU’s full-court press.
West Virginia is averaging 91.8 points per game and has limited its opponents to just 38.6 percent shooting from the field, including 30.3 percent from 3.
“I think the players think (conference play is) more important,” said Huggins. “I think in their minds there’s a lot more riding on it.”
Tip off is set for 4 p.m. and the game will be televised nationally on ESPN2.
Briefly:
* Friday’s game will be the fourth consecutive year West Virginia is beginning conference play on the road. In fact, once again WVU will have its first two league games on the road, but unlike years past, this season the Mountaineers will return to Morgantown following Friday’s game and then will hop on an airplane and fly out to Lubbock, Texas, to play Texas Tech on Tuesday night at 9 p.m.
“I thought we had a pretty good deal figured out and then they changed it,” said Huggins. “I don’t know why you would not play like we had been doing Saturday-Monday. To be on ESPNews on Tuesday at 9 o’clock at night does not make a lot of sense to me. I think we could give up the ESPNews game to save us a trip.
“It’s interesting because every game that you watch in our league the announcers talk about the ‘tough trip to Morgantown’ and the long plane ride,” Huggins continued. “Well, they ought to be in Morgantown making it the other way nine times. I think the most disappointing thing to this point - and I openly said it was terrific; I think what the league did the prior couple of years was gave us one less trip and now we’re right back kind of in the same boat.”
The veteran coach pointed out that because of the late start, the team will not return to Morgantown until the wee hours of the morning.
“It’s a 9 o’clock game. That means we will not get back to our practice facility until 5:30 in the morning. Now how is that in the best interests of our student-athletes? If everybody else did what we do I think they’d be a heck of a lot more understanding,” Huggins said.
* Huggins was asked about the conversation he had with Underwood following his team’s loss to Underwood’s team Stephen F. Austin in the NCAA tournament.
“We talked for quite a while afterwards about a lot of stuff. I think I’ve been very open and very honest in that I don’t think our guys took them very seriously,” Huggins admitted. “I thought our guys had horrible practices and as much as I tried to get them back on track I couldn’t do it. We came out really flat and they came out and hit us in the mouth.”
* West Virginia has a 24-12 record in Big 12 play over the last two seasons heading into Friday’s game. Four of those victories have come against Oklahoma State.
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