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With Mother in Attendance, WVU's West Drops in 23
February 21, 2017 03:35 PM | Men's Basketball
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - Getting a room full of alpha males to agree on anything is a major accomplishment. But there is one thing these days on which everybody involved with West Virginia University basketball is in total agreement - Lamont West’s mother, Tonya, probably needs to get to some more games this year.
The last time Mrs. West was inside the Coliseum her son dropped 21 points on Oklahoma State. He made six of 12 from three and singlehandedly kept the Mountaineers in a game they eventually lost, 82-75.
Last night, Lamont was at it again, personally flipping an early 10-point Mountaineer deficit into a 12-point lead. West nailed three after three after three until someone on the Texas bench finally realized that it might be a good idea to put someone on him.
Before that happened, 20 points had already been recorded next to West’s name in the scorebook and the Longhorns were trailing by 14 at halftime.
And right there watching it all happen in person was his mother.
“Whenever she comes I always try and impress her and play my best,” he said after scoring a career-high 23 points against the Longhorns on six of eight shooting from three. “I don’t want to be out there slouching around, not doing nothing. It’s not like she came out here for nothing, so I always want to impress her.”
Boy, did he ever.
For a good portion of the first half, Coliseum public address announcer Bill Nevin was stuck on “THREEEEE, Lamont West!” - much to the delight of 10,460 who came out two hours later than usual to watch some Monday night college basketball before doing some late-night, deer-dodging on the drive home.
It got to the point last night when West Virginia coach Bob Huggins was dialing up just about every play he could think of to get the ball to his hot-shooting freshman forward - isos, ball screens, penetrate and pitch and even some of the John Beilein stuff he stole from the players he once inherited from Beilein.
When you have a guy shooting the way West was last night, game plans sometimes must be altered.
“You just feed him,” junior guard Jevon Carter admitted. “You try and make him your first look once he hits a couple in a row and you try to get it to him wherever you can.”
Carter is usually a pretty serious dude, particularly when it comes to the media stuff after games. Getting him to crack a smile or laugh is not always an easy thing to do, unless you bring up Lamont West.
“Yeah, he’s a little different,” Carter chuckled. “He’s very confident. He came here saying he was the best shooter that we will ever see and he’s been doing what he does.”
“He’s a Cincinnati guy,” teammate Elijah Macon added. “He’s just like Devin (Williams) man. It’s that little Cincinnati in them.”
For West, leaving the Queen City to play a year of basketball in Lithonia, Georgia, was probably the best thing that has ever happened to his basketball career.
Although his stats weren’t great at Miller Grove High, and his name couldn’t be found on any of the Georgia all-state teams that year, he did get noticed by West Virginia associate head coach Larry Harrison, who has seen countless players like West who usually turn out well playing for Bob Huggins.
West’s college choices were either West Virginia, Arkansas or a bunch of mid-major schools, so he chose the guy he grew up following when he lived in Cincinnati - Huggins.
This pairing could one day turn out to be a special one.
West possesses the one attribute that Huggins admires most - he’s a hard worker.
“We watched film for a half hour (Monday) and then we were on the floor for maybe an hour and Lamont was probably out there for another hour and a half on his own,” Huggins said. “I walked in two hours before the game and he was one of three guys down there shooting the ball then.
“That just goes to my theory that if you’re in the gym and you work at it … Billy (Hahn) says it’s the Basketball Gods. ‘If you cheat the game of basketball it catches up to you.’ He’s in the gym all the time.”
Therefore, it’s not an accident West has become such an outstanding shooter. His three-point shooting alone will always provide big value to the team, as was the case a decade ago when Frank Young was doing the same thing for Beilein.
But for West to stay on the floor for longer periods of time, he’s got to improve his defense, grab some more rebounds and fully understand what the rest of his teammates are doing on offense.
To his credit, West understands his current shortcomings.
“I’ve got to do a better job on defense and I know that,” he said. “I’ve got to do a better job with knowing what to do in certain situations. It’s knowing personnel stuff and things like that - knowing somebody who likes to drive left, don’t let him go left. Stuff like that.”
“He’s getting better at listening and paying attention to things,” Macon added. “I tell him, ‘You are the best shooter on the team. You have to shoot the ball. If you have to put it on the floor to get to the basket, shoot it. If not, go screen somebody. Do the simple things to keep yourself in the game because you’ve got to be in the game more and playing just like everybody else is playing.”
Great advice, for sure.
Here’s another little tip, Lamont - make sure your mother has postseason tickets!
“She’s going to have to start coming a lot more often, yeah,” said Huggins.
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Thursday, April 16
Ross Hodge, Honor Huff & Brenen Lorient | Oklahoma Postgame
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Ross Hodge, Treysen Eaglestaff & Brenen Lorient | Creighton Postgame
Saturday, April 04
Ross Hodge & Honor Huff | Stanford Postgame
Thursday, April 02
