MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Fresh off their historic upset victory at seventh-ranked Kansas on Tuesday afternoon, the 10-2 West Virginia Mountaineers ring in the New Year with a Saturday afternoon Big 12 clash against Oklahoma State.
 
The Cowboys began conference play with a 60-47 home loss to Houston on Monday.
 
In that game, Western Kentucky transfer Brandon Newman, a 6-foot-5 senior guard, came off the bench to lead Oklahoma State with 12 points. Former Texas Tech player Robert Jennings, a 6-foot-7 junior forward, contributed 10.
 
Marchelus Avery also comes off the bench and leads the Cowboys in scoring (12.3 ppg.) and 3-point field goals (21). 
 
Avery, a 6-foot-8 forward, played last season at UCF and briefly considered entering the NBA draft before transferring to Oklahoma State.
 
The Cowboys' other double-digit scorer is Abou Ousmane, a 6-foot-10, 245-pound senior who played last season at Xavier. He is averaging 11.5 points per game and pulling down a team-best 5.5 rebounds per contest.
 
Senior guard Bryce Thompson is one of three holdovers from last year's team and is averaging 9.7 points per game.
 
Forward Patrick Suemnick is a familiar name to Mountaineer fans. He played at WVU last year before putting his name into the transfer portal and landing in Stillwater. Suemnick shows averages of 2.6 points and 1.7 rebounds in 11 games.
 
Coach Steve Lutz is in his first season leading the Oklahoma State program after brief head coaching stops at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi and at Western Kentucky, where he led the Hilltoppers to a 22-12 record last season and first-round game in the NCAA Tournament.
 
Lutz has won 20 or more games in every season he's coached.  
 
So far at Oklahoma State, Lutz has led the Cowboys to an 8-4 record with early wins over Green Bay, St. Thomas, Southern Illinois, Miami, Tulsa, Seton Hall, Tarleton State and Oral Roberts.
 
OSU also lost 86-78 to Florida Atlantic and shows double-digit defeats to Nevada and Oklahoma.
 
Last year, Oklahoma State used 15 points and 12 rebounds from Javon Small to defeat West Virginia 70-66 at Gallagher-Iba Arena.
 
Now, Small is playing for the Mountaineers and is leading the Big 12 in scoring with an average of 19.2 points per game. He scored 13 points, including the team's final seven, grabbed 11 rebounds and handed out six assists in Tuesday's victory at Kansas.
 
It was Small's free throw with 1.8 seconds left the provided the winning margin for the Mountaineers.
 
West Virginia is now 3-0 against nationally ranked teams under coach Darian DeVries. The Mountaineers also collected early-season victories against third-ranked Gonzaga and 24^th-ranked Arizona.
 
West Virginia is hunting for its first 2-0 start to conference play since 2018.
 
Saturday's game will tip off at noon and will be televised nationally on the CBS Sports Network. Mountaineer Sports Network radio coverage with Tony Caridi, Brad Howe and David Kahn tips things off at 11 a.m. on stations throughout West Virginia, online via WVUsports.com and the Varsity Network and WVU Game day apps.
 
Tickets are still available and can be purchased through the Mountaineer Ticket Office by logging on to WVUGAME.com.