MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia, playing the second toughest schedule in the country, will try and snap its six-game losing streak Tuesday night at Oklahoma.
 
The Sooners (15-14, 5-11) are coming off a 66-62 overtime victory over Oklahoma State in a Bedlam game played in Norman this past Saturday.
 
OU got 14 points and 10 rebounds from forward Tanner Groves and was able to recover from blowing a 14-point, second-half lead in overtime. Oklahoma missed a tip-in at the buzzer that would have given the Sooners the victory in regulation.
 
Oklahoma eventually took control of the game in the extra session when Oklahoma State 7-foot center Moussa Cisse fouled out with 31 seconds left. Groves hit a pair of free throws and then Marvin Johnson made a steal and a layup.
 
Tanner Groves and his brother Jacob were an issue for West Virginia in OU's 72-62 victory over the Mountaineers in Morgantown late last month.
 
Tanner scored 21 points on 9-of-11 shooting while Jacob finished with 12, including a couple of critical 3s. Oklahoma outrebounded West Virginia 32-26 and held the Mountaineers to 37.7% shooting for the game.
 
"They have a bunch of guys they can put on the floor who can make shots," West Virginia coach Bob Huggins said.
 
West Virginia (14-15, 3-13) has figured things out offensively in its last two losses to Iowa State and Texas, but that may have come at the expense of its defense.
 
"We're trying to play the best guys we have," Huggins explained.
 
WVU scored 81 points in both one-possession losses and was in position to win both games. At Iowa State, ISU's Izaiah Washington stole West Virginia's inbound pass leading to his go-ahead score with 22 seconds left.
 
Guard Malik Curry's short jumper and forward Gabe Osabuohien's put-back try were unsuccessful.
 
In last Saturday's one-point loss to Texas, the Mountaineers squandered a 10-point, second-half lead but still had an opportunity to win the game when Andrew Jones was unable to secure Timmy Allen's inbound pass near West Virginia's bench with 9.5 seconds left.
 
Curry once again had an opportunity to win the game, but his 16-footer from the foul line glanced off the rim.
 
"The last couple of games, I thought our guys played really hard," Huggins said. "We were less than an inch away from beating Texas. If that ball goes an inch farther, we win. He got a good shot, and he was the guy who was making shots."
 
WVU's defense allowed Texas to shoot an alarming 63.4% for the game to follow up Iowa State's 55.1% shooting percentage the game prior. TCU shot 53.7% in its 77-67 win over the Mountaineers in Fort Worth last Monday, and Kansas connected on 48.1% of its field goal attempts in a 71-58 win in Morgantown.
 
For the season, West Virginia is allowing its opponents to shoot 44.2%, which is 231^st in the country and near the bottom among high major teams.
 
Big 12 opponents are also averaging 74.4 points per game against WVU this season.
 
"We're not as good as we've been in the past defensively, and we don't have a protector near the rim," Huggins said. "We kind of got spoiled with that. You can't continue to let teams shoot 60% against you."
 
Curry is coming off a career-high 27 points against the Longhorns after scoring 19 in the Iowa State loss to boost his season scoring average to 8.9 points per game.
 
Osabuohien is giving the Mountaineers more offense with 31 points in WVU's last two games, including connecting on 16 of his last 18 free throw attempts. After once shooting in the low 30s from the free throw line, Osabuohien is now above 50% from there (52.2%).
 
Senior guards Taz Sherman (18.3 ppg.) and Sean McNeil (12.5 ppg.) continue to lead West Virginia in scoring, but Sherman has made just 11 of his last 32 shot attempts while McNeil has managed only 20 points in WVU's last three games.
 
Mountaineer fans hope those two can regain their shooting strokes.
 
Tuesday night's game will tip off at 7 p.m. and will be televised nationally on ESPN2 (Rich Hollenberg and Fran Fraschilla). Mountaineer Sports Network coverage with Tony Caridi and Jay Jacobs begins at 6 p.m. on stations throughout West Virginia and online via WVUsports.com and the popular mobile app WVU Gameday. Satellite radio listeners can access the MSN broadcast on XM channel 383 or channel 973 on the Sirius/XM app.
 
West Virginia concludes the regular season on Saturday afternoon at the WVU Coliseum against TCU.