MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia will attempt to get back to its winning ways on Saturday afternoon when it faces 20^th-ranked Texas at the WVU Coliseum.
 
This morning, West Virginia University announced that Saturday's game is sold out which should give coach Bob Huggins' struggling basketball team a big boost.
 
"It helps us a bunch," Huggins said. "Playing here in the Coliseum is really good for us. People have been wonderful and we could not ask for a better crowd and a better fan base."
 
The Mountaineers (14-14, 3-12) are coming off a disappointing 84-81 defeat at Iowa State on Wednesday night. West Virginia led the Cyclones 81-80 with less than 25 seconds left in the game with possession of the basketball underneath Iowa State's basket.
 
WVU tried twice to advance the ball. The first time, guard Sean McNeil was trapped in the corner and teammate Taz Sherman called timeout. When play resume, Iowa State's Izaiah Brockington stole Sherman's inbound pass and scored to give the Cyclones an 82-81 lead.
 
West Virginia's Malik Curry tried a short jumper that rolled off the rim, Gabe Osabuohien's put-back try was unsuccessful and Iowa State's Gabe Kalsheur was fouled by Jalen Bridges after grabbing the rebound.
 
He made both free throws and Sherman missed a long 3 to try and tie the game with four seconds left.
 
"We've got the ball with (22 seconds) left and the lead, so you're supposed to put the game away," Huggins said. "We didn't line up in the right place and it's hard to run what you want to run when they do that. And it wasn't one guy, it was a bunch of guys."
 
Wednesday night's loss spoiled a career-high 19 point performance by Osabuohien, who was also 8 of 9 from the free throw line. Curry contributed 19 points off the bench getting the minutes normally allocated to Kedrian Johnson, who missed Wednesday night's game after suffering a hip injury during the pregame walk through.
 
Freshman Kobe Johnson got the starting nod at point guard in Kedrian Johnson's place.
 
"(Kedrian) is hurting but he's been hurting for a long time," Huggins said. "When you're that skinny and you continually run into back screens and the on-the-ball screens he's sore. He can hardly walk."
 
West Virginia's 81 points were the most points scored in a Big 12 game this year and were 14 more than it scored during Monday night's loss at TCU.
 
Huggins said he gave the team off yesterday and went out on the road recruiting.
 
The Mountaineers have dropped five straight and 12 of their last 13 after a 13-2 start to the season. One of West Virginia's 12 conference defeats this year came at Texas on Jan. 1, when the undermanned Mountaineers were without Sherman, Osabuohien and Kobe Johnson because of COVID-19 health and safety protocols.
 
Texas led West Virginia 39-20 at halftime, but the Mountaineers rallied in the second half to outscore the Longhorns 39-35. Jalen Bridges was West Virginia's top point-getter with 18, while Curry contributed 14 and McNeil added 12.
 
Texas got 20 points from guard Marcus Carr and 15 from backcourt mate Courtney Ramey.
 
"We didn't have our full team down there, which had a lot to do (with the loss)," Huggins said. 
 
The Longhorns are coming off a 75-66 win over TCU in Austin. Guard Andrew Jones scored 21, Carr had 19 and Timmy Allen scored 17 points and grabbed seven rebounds against the Horned Frogs.
 
Texas rallied from five points down at halftime to improve to 20-8, 9-6.
 
"They're a lot more cohesive now and playing together for this amount of time you're going to get that way," Huggins said of the Longhorns.
 
Texas is 3-6 in road games, including a 3-4 mark in league road games this year. Saturday's meeting will be the 25^th all-time meeting in series play with Texas holding a 14-10 advantage.
 
Last year, the two teams split games with West Virginia winning in Austin and Texas winning in Morgantown.
 
A 2 p.m. tip time has been assigned by ESPN, with Rich Hollenberg and Fran Fraschilla calling the game. Mountaineers Sports Network radio coverage begins at 1 p.m. on stations throughout West Virginia and online via WVUsports.com and the popular mobile app WVU Gameday. Satellite radio users can access the radio broadcast on XM channel 383 and channel 973 on the Sirius/XM app.