Box Score MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia rallied from six points down at halftime to knock off Missouri State 67-59 in Josh Eilert's head coaching debut for the Mountaineers.
 
After missing 21 straight field goal attempts to finish the first half, it took West Virginia only three minutes to erase Missouri State's lead by making its first six shots of the second half. A Quinn Slazinski 3 gave the Mountaineers a 36-33 lead, and then an Ofri Naveh 3 pushed the lead to 41-38.
 
A couple of Seth Wilson 3s, plus two baskets by forward Patrick Suemnick coming off the bench, got the lead to eight with 8:58 to play.
 
Chance Moore, who led all scorers with 24 points, got hot from behind the arc and his fifth 3 of the game reduced West Virginia's lead to 61-59 with 41 seconds left.
 
Missouri State (0-1) continued with full-court pressure, but the Mountaineers broke it easily and Slazinski scored a driving layup. Then, Moore's missed 3 was grabbed by Slazinski, who got the ball down the floor to Josiah Harris for a breakaway dunk.
 
After Moore's missed free throw, WVU got through more pressure with Naveh flipping a pass down the floor for another Harris dunk to finish the game with an exclamation point.
 
Slazinski led West Virginia with 18 points while adding seven rebounds; Jesse Edwards contributed 13 points and 13 rebounds and Wilson finished with 11 points, all of them coming in the second half.
 
The Mountaineers (1-0) made 18 of their 31 second-half field goal attempts after missing all but four of their 32 first-half attempts.
 
"That first half I thought about changing professions," Eilert joked. "I was like, 'What did I get myself into late in the first half?' But they turned it around. We had a nice heart to heart at halftime and it was a tale of two halves."
 
WVU began the game on a 15-4 run before going cold after Edwards' layup with 14:07 remaining. The free throw line is what kept West Virginia in it, the Mountaineers connecting on 15-of-18 in the first half and 16-of-20 for the game.
 
West Virginia never trailed after regaining the lead with 16:34 remaining.
 
"We started the game well," Eilert said. "We had a lot of energy coming out of the gate and then I think we got a little selfish and we abandoned what our approach was offensively."
 
Eight of West Virginia's nine players dressed for tonight's game saw action and seven ended up scoring. With Arizona transfer Kerr Kriisa serving a nine-game suspension and Georgetown transfer Akok Akok sitting out after suffering a medical emergency in the charity exhibition game against George Mason, Eilert used a starting five consisting of Kobe Johnson and Wilson at guards, with Harris, Slazinski and Edwards in the front court.
 
Naveh came off the bench to spell Harris, Suemnick was used to relieve bigs Slazinski and Edwards, while Florida State transfer Jeremiah Bembry was brought in to give Johnson a rest at point guard.
 
Eilert gave Edwards frequent rests ahead of the media timeouts and occasionally used some zone defense to try and slow down the Bears.
 
"We had to get creative," Eilert explained. "I'm not really a zone coach by any means but we wanted to throw that 2-3 out there several times out of timeouts to give them a different look. We were also doing some matchup stuff and you just want to keep them off guard, especially when you're trying to save legs and you don't have a deep bench.
 
"Credit to everyone that came in tonight," Eilert added.
 
Alston Mason was the only other Missouri State player to reach double figures with 15 points. Missouri State returned three starters from last year's squad that ranked among the top defensive teams in the country. 
 
West Virginia out-rebounded Missouri State 46-to-40, outscored the Bears 28-to-22 in the paint, 17-to-11 off second-chance baskets and 11-to-6 on fast breaks.
 
Overall, the Mountaineers shot 34.9% to the Bears' 35.4%.
 
West Virginia is now 99-16 in season openers and 105-10 in home openers.
 
A crowd of 9,691 was announced for tonight's game. WVU director of athletics Wren Baker presented Eilert a game ball in the locker room afterward for his first coaching victory.
 
WVU has a quick turnaround with Monmouth looming on Friday night. That game will be televised on ESPN+.