Photo by: All Pro Photography/Dale Sparks
WVU's Huggins Seeking More Rebounds
October 29, 2017 12:37 PM | Men's Basketball
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - For those who frequently watch sporting events, it's amazing the varying degrees of opinions and conclusions that can be drawn from any single game.
For instance, the estimated 5,100 who left the WVU Coliseum after last night's 98-67 charity exhibition game against Albany saw a high-scoring, athletic WVU team that got up and down the court, shot the ball well from the outside and once again effectively used its full-court press to create 24 turnovers.
They saw sophomore forward Lamont West drop in 26 points on eight-of-14 shooting - five of those coming from 3.
They saw freshman Teddy Allen play assertively, albeit a little unorthodoxly, in his public debut with 15 points, many of those coming from that windup jumper of his.
They saw Sagaba Konate soar into the air to block four shots; they saw senior guard Jevon Carter running the team the way he always does and they saw James Bolden come into the game, as he did several times last year, to provide rapid-fire scoring.
But then there were the things their coach Bob Huggins saw, too, which don't always line up with what the rest of us saw.
He saw the 26 West scored, but he was not entirely comfortable with how he got them. Specifically, the number of 3s the team took - 35, which was almost half the total number of shot attempts the Mountaineers tried for the night.
"Way too many 3s," he said. "Nearly half of our shots were 3s. That's not a formula for success, but when you throw it into your post guys and they fumble it around and they don't score it in close then you probably ought to shoot 'em."
Which they did.
You could tell Huggins wanted to run offense and try and get the ball inside to Konate and even sophomore Logan Routt to see how much improvement they have made during the offseason with their offensive games in the blocks.
That still remains a mystery.
He wanted to see his team get out in transition and score some easy baskets. That didn't happen either, and he believes that's partly the fault of some of his older players.
"We got some (points) off of steals but we didn't get a point off of transition," he said.
Huggins thought there were way too many fouls called during the game (56 combined) and he's got some legitimate concerns about how the new rules are going to be implemented and how the games are going to be officiated.
It's hard to win games when half your team has either fouled out or is sitting on the bench in foul trouble.
He's also struggling with the increasing number of basket interference calls being made.
"I've got to figure it out, because I haven't figured it out," he said. "Then, are we going to chuck cutters or are we not going to chuck cutters? Are we going to call traveling when guys switch pivot feet or are we not going to call it?
"It makes a difference. I want to go back and look at the film because I think I saw things they didn't see and they probably saw things I didn't see that I need to see, so that's why I'm going to go back and look at the film and see where I can get better."
But most of all, Huggins took a much different view than most of us on his team's plus-nine rebounding margin. In his eyes, it should have been far more.
At one point during the second half, the advantage was just one and it only grew bigger when Albany began to get tired as the press wore them down.
That is what was on Huggins' mind when he was asked about West's 26 points.
"Lamont has got to rebound the ball for us," he said. "We were really bad rebounding the ball (tonight). Wes (Harris) gets eight, JC (Carter) gets six and our bigs got …"
I'll finish it for him … not enough to his liking.
But they will get better. They always do under Huggins. There is still the cloak-and-dagger scrimmage coming up against Purdue - the fine details of which we will never learn - and there are plenty of more practices to get his team ready for its season opener on Friday, Nov. 10 against Texas A&M.
It's obvious listening to Huggins talk after Saturday's game that they are going to need them.
Most of the details from last year's game against Texas A&M in Morgantown have escaped us, except for the fact that West Virginia beat the Aggies, 81-77.
However, Huggins hasn't forgotten those details, nor did he forget that all of those bigs Texas A&M had last year that were supposed to move on to the NBA didn't move on to the NBA.
And that's probably why he would have liked to have seen his bigs grab a few more rebounds against Albany, because they are going to be much harder to grab in a couple of weeks against Texas A&M.
For instance, the estimated 5,100 who left the WVU Coliseum after last night's 98-67 charity exhibition game against Albany saw a high-scoring, athletic WVU team that got up and down the court, shot the ball well from the outside and once again effectively used its full-court press to create 24 turnovers.
They saw sophomore forward Lamont West drop in 26 points on eight-of-14 shooting - five of those coming from 3.
They saw freshman Teddy Allen play assertively, albeit a little unorthodoxly, in his public debut with 15 points, many of those coming from that windup jumper of his.
They saw Sagaba Konate soar into the air to block four shots; they saw senior guard Jevon Carter running the team the way he always does and they saw James Bolden come into the game, as he did several times last year, to provide rapid-fire scoring.
But then there were the things their coach Bob Huggins saw, too, which don't always line up with what the rest of us saw.
He saw the 26 West scored, but he was not entirely comfortable with how he got them. Specifically, the number of 3s the team took - 35, which was almost half the total number of shot attempts the Mountaineers tried for the night.
"Way too many 3s," he said. "Nearly half of our shots were 3s. That's not a formula for success, but when you throw it into your post guys and they fumble it around and they don't score it in close then you probably ought to shoot 'em."
Which they did.
You could tell Huggins wanted to run offense and try and get the ball inside to Konate and even sophomore Logan Routt to see how much improvement they have made during the offseason with their offensive games in the blocks.
That still remains a mystery.
He wanted to see his team get out in transition and score some easy baskets. That didn't happen either, and he believes that's partly the fault of some of his older players.
"We got some (points) off of steals but we didn't get a point off of transition," he said.
Huggins thought there were way too many fouls called during the game (56 combined) and he's got some legitimate concerns about how the new rules are going to be implemented and how the games are going to be officiated.
It's hard to win games when half your team has either fouled out or is sitting on the bench in foul trouble.
He's also struggling with the increasing number of basket interference calls being made.
"I've got to figure it out, because I haven't figured it out," he said. "Then, are we going to chuck cutters or are we not going to chuck cutters? Are we going to call traveling when guys switch pivot feet or are we not going to call it?
"It makes a difference. I want to go back and look at the film because I think I saw things they didn't see and they probably saw things I didn't see that I need to see, so that's why I'm going to go back and look at the film and see where I can get better."
But most of all, Huggins took a much different view than most of us on his team's plus-nine rebounding margin. In his eyes, it should have been far more.
At one point during the second half, the advantage was just one and it only grew bigger when Albany began to get tired as the press wore them down.
That is what was on Huggins' mind when he was asked about West's 26 points.
"Lamont has got to rebound the ball for us," he said. "We were really bad rebounding the ball (tonight). Wes (Harris) gets eight, JC (Carter) gets six and our bigs got …"
I'll finish it for him … not enough to his liking.
But they will get better. They always do under Huggins. There is still the cloak-and-dagger scrimmage coming up against Purdue - the fine details of which we will never learn - and there are plenty of more practices to get his team ready for its season opener on Friday, Nov. 10 against Texas A&M.
It's obvious listening to Huggins talk after Saturday's game that they are going to need them.
Most of the details from last year's game against Texas A&M in Morgantown have escaped us, except for the fact that West Virginia beat the Aggies, 81-77.
However, Huggins hasn't forgotten those details, nor did he forget that all of those bigs Texas A&M had last year that were supposed to move on to the NBA didn't move on to the NBA.
And that's probably why he would have liked to have seen his bigs grab a few more rebounds against Albany, because they are going to be much harder to grab in a couple of weeks against Texas A&M.
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