KANSAS CITY – The first thing media members were handed upon entering the Sprint Center today was a pink sheet of paper outlining the Big 12's safety protocol concerning the spread of the COVID-19 virus.
A big pile of antibacterial wipes were available in the media room, and the student-athletes and coaches were kept a safe distance away from the people asking them questions at all times.
Well, tomorrow, if the West Virginia players remain as far away from Oklahoma's jump shooters as they were kept from the media today, then the Mountaineers are going to be in big trouble.
West Virginia is going to have to get right up into these Sooners for a full 40 minutes if it wants to advance to Friday's semifinal round of the Phillips 66 Big 12 Championships here in Kansas City – something it has done in each of the last four years.
Third-seeded Oklahoma (19-12) has certainly gotten the full attention of sixth-seeded West Virginia (21-10) because of what it did to the Mountaineers this year in sweeping the season series.
Both losses were by double digit margins and were two of West Virginia's poorer performances of the season. In Norman, the Mountaineers took 27 more shots than the Sooners and actually missed more shots (52) than Oklahoma attempted (49).
WVU continued to fire blanks 21 days later in a 73-62 loss in Morgantown. Although the margin of defeat was one point greater, West Virginia missed fewer shots than it did in the first loss, so that's progress.
West Virginia is also going to have to come up with a way of slowing down Oklahoma's three-man game of Kristian Doolittle, Brady Manek and Austin Reaves. Those three combined to score 47 points in the win in Norman before adding 44 more in the rematch.
That's 91 points in two games coming from just three players.
Manek and Reaves can really shoot it, especially when left wide open, but Doolittle brings the total package to the table at 6-feet-7, 232 pounds. He's averaging a team-best 15.8 points and 8.9 rebounds per game while also handing out a pair of assists.
"Doolittle is a really good player," West Virginia's
Derek Culver, one of the players tasked with trying to slow him down, said. "He attacks from all three levels – he can score it inside, mid-range and from the 3. When you have a high-dynamic player like that you really have to be on your Ps and Qs when it comes to defensing things."
Culver said Doolittle's unselfishness often opens things up for Reaves and Manek on the wings when you overhelp to try and stop him off the bounce.
"He's a really good driver being from the position that he is, and he can kick it out to his teammates. He doesn't just play 'me basketball' and I feel like me and my teammates have to do a good job of cutting down his options when he drives," Culver said.
Teammate
Oscar Tshiebwe admits it's also on him to do a much better job of handling Oklahoma's ball screens - something he was never asked to do before he came to college this past fall.
"This is really, really different than high school with ball screens, and hedging is still so hard for me because I'm learning," he explained. "Even today, I still have that problem and coach is yelling at me every single day in practice from not hedging.
"With hedging, sometimes I stay too long, and that's when coach says, 'When your man leaves, you've got to leave with him!' These past few days we've been doing really well if your man is setting a ball screen and he's leaving, we've got to make sure we leave with them. It's not my job to stop the ball, that's the guard's job to stop the ball. I think I'm getting better at that."
That means slowing down Oklahoma's dribble penetration is going to fall on the shoulders of
Jermaine Haley,
Chase Harler, Deuce McBride and the other guards out on the floor.
Haley noted that it's not easy defending Oklahoma's sets because they do such a good job of running offense and their bigs are so proficient out on the perimeter with the ball in their hands.
"It's kind of awkward guarding them because they have a four and a five that you really have to guard," Haley said. "As guards it's about fighting over the screens and making sure the bigs are helping, but then them getting back on their man after having help side on the shooters. Overall, it's going to be an effort thing. That's kind of been our problem these last few weeks is just giving max effort the whole 40 minutes during the game.
"There are five guys on the court and more guys on the bench, so everybody is going to have to give effort on defense," the senior added. "All of these guys here (sitting at the dais) are long and can go out and defend ball screen just like me and Gabe (Osabuohien), so it's got to be a team effort."
Usually,
Bob Huggins is the one doing most of the talking about defense, but today his mind was mostly on offense, specifically, West Virginia's lack of it in the losses to the Sooners.
Was it a matter of Oklahoma playing great defense or West Virginia not being able to hit the Monongahela River from the middle of the Star City Bridge?
Tomorrow's game should give us a much clearer picture of that.
"Honestly, defense really hasn't been our problem," Huggins said Wednesday. "We didn't make any shots. I think through the stretch when we had a hard time winning it wasn't that we had that many glaring mistakes defensively … we didn't make shots, and I think what you notice is when you don't make shots your head goes down.
"Your head goes down a lot faster than it comes back up and I think we started making some shots and were fortunate to win some games, and I think we got our head back up," Huggins said.
The effort was clearly there during last Saturday's 76-64 season-ending win against Baylor. The players say the effort has also been there in practice the last couple of days.
"You've seen a lot of the intensity pick up during drills," Culver said. "Coaches kind of harp on the little things, and things that may seem pointless to everybody else are very vital to us. If we keep doing a good job of listening to the coaches we will be alright.
"The guys understand that every possession here counts and you've just got to play hard," Harler added. "Anyone can beat anyone in this tournament, so you have to come out with more effort."
Which means invading the personal space of the Oklahoma players, even if it runs the risk of spreading some germs.
Thursday's game against the Sooners will begin approximately 30 minutes after the conclusion of the first game of the evening session featuring No. 2 Baylor and the winner of tonight's opening round game between No. 7 TCU and No. 10 Kansas State.
The first game tonight has No. 8 Oklahoma State going against No. 9 Iowa State with the winner facing top-seeded Kansas in tomorrow's second game of the afternoon session.
Game one Thursday afternoon will pit No. 4 Texas against No. 5 Texas Tech.
West Virginia's matchup against Oklahoma will be televised nationally on ESPN2.
The Mountaineers are 8-7 in Big 12 Tournament action and reached the finals in 2016, 2017 and 2018.
"They want to win something. They want to be able to hang a banner and winning a tournament here would hang a banner. We've been in the finals three times and haven't won. We've almost gotten there, and these guys want to be the ones to get there," Huggins concluded.
Update - A statement from the Big 12 Conference regarding its response to the recent outbreak of the COVID-19 virus: "The priority of the Big 12 Conference is to ensure the safety of our students, coaches, administrators, event staff and fans. After careful consideration and consulting with medical officials, other conferences, the NCAA and local officials, the Big 12 Conference announced that after tonight's men's first round games, all remaining Phillips 66 Big 12 Men's and Women's Basketball Championship games will be played with only family, friends, media and essential staff permitted in the arenas."
Update #2 - WVU Director of Athletics and Associate Vice President
Shane Lyons: "I understand and support Commissioner Bob Bowlsby's decision to go to a limited access protocol for the 2020 Big 12 men's and women's basketball championships. Based on the recommendation of medical professionals, it is a necessary decision to help curb the threat of spreading the COVID-19. We will announce information on refunds for the fans who purchased all-session tickets through the Mountaineer Ticket Office in the coming days."
