Box Score The rollercoaster West Virginia has been riding for the last month was on full display during tonight's 77-71 victory at Iowa State.
 
The first 20 minutes were very good, the youthful Mountaineers leading the Cyclones 44-31 at intermission. Then the next 10 weren't so good, but West Virginia managed to come up with enough winning plays down the stretch to end its three-game losing streak and claim just its second conference road triumph of the season.
 
In the process, Bob Huggins moved into sole possession of sixth place on the NCAA all-time wins list passing North Carolina's Dean Smith.
 
"We kind of had control of it coming out of halftime and we kind of let it slip away a little bit," Huggins said. "But I think we did grow up a little bit. If this was two or three weeks ago, we probably would have not come back when we fell behind."
 
Career win No. 880 for Huggins wasn't looking too promising with 10:42 to go when Rasir Bolton's 3 gave Iowa State a 54-50 lead, but a couple of his freshmen came to the rescue.
 
Forward Oscar Tshiebwe scored near the basket to reduce Iowa State's lead to two, and then guard Miles McBride lined up a 3 at the top of the key to give West Virginia back the lead with 8:25 left.
 
Two Taz Sherman free throws pushed the margin to three before Bolton's layup tied the game at 60 with six to go.
 
The next 10 points in this back-and-forth affair came from the guys wearing blue, Derek Culver getting things going with a second-chanced bucket. A Prentiss Nixon turnover resulted in Jermaine Haley's layup and Tshiebwe's traditional three-point play followed a Culver free throw to make it an eight-point game.
 
The lead swelled to 10 when Haley got loose for another transition basket with 2:47 to go, but Iowa scored the next five points to make it a two-possession game.
 
The lead was down to three when Tre Jackson hit a deep 3 with 47 seconds remaining and Bolton cut it to two with 23 seconds showing when he got the second of two free throws to go down.
 
But West Virginia, next to last in the Big 12 in free throw shooting at 63.8 percent, got four in a row from McBride at the line to put this one away.
 
McBride made all six of his free throws tonight and finished with a team-high-tying 17 points. Culver also scored 17 and just missed a double-double with nine rebounds.
 
Tshiebwe, who has missed double-figure points in three of his last four games, contributed 11 and grabbed nine boards. 
 
The freshman was 5-for-5 from the line.
 
Sherman gave the Mountaineers a big boost in the first half by scoring 12 on 3-of-5 shooting.
 
"It was a team effort," Huggins said. "I thought Deuce played really well, but Derek was really good on the glass and Oscar stepped to the line and made free throws. And Jermaine was good with the ball."
 
West Virginia got five 3s to go down tonight, four of those coming in the first half when it built its biggest lead at 14 points.
 
The Mountaineers shot 44.3 percent from the floor and made 18-of-23 from the line for 78 percent. WVU was an impressive 18-of-21 from the foul line in the second half. West Virginia generated 34 points from its bench and had a 38-to-30 edge on the glass.
 
Iowa State got a game-high 21 points from Bolton. Nixon added 19 for the Cyclones, which drop to 12-18, 5-12 on the season.
 
"We were a little tougher today than what we have been," Huggins said.
 
Tonight's victory gives WVU 20 for the season for the ninth time in 13 years under Huggins. It's his 30^th 20-win campaign in 38 seasons as a collegiate coach.
 
The victory also keeps West Virginia (20-10, 8-9) a half-game ahead of TCU in the Big 12 standings with the Horned Frogs facing No. 1 Kansas tomorrow night in Lawrence.
 
Texas got a big last-second win over Oklahoma to move into a tie with Texas Tech for third place at 9-8. The Sooners and Mountaineers have identical 8-9 records in fifth, but Oklahoma owns the tiebreaker by sweeping the season series.
 
"Hopefully this really helps us and helps us grow up some," Huggins said. "We've got to keep our head in it, keep getting better and we're looking forward to playing Baylor."
 
West Virginia concludes the regular season in Morgantown on Saturday when it faces the fourth-ranked Bears at noon. It will be the final home game for seniors Chase Harler, Jermaine Haley and Logan Routt.