Mountaineers Rally For 59-54 Victory Over Kansas State

Tuesday, January 27

Morgantown, W.Va.

8:30 p.m.

West Virginia University

Kansas State

WVU vs Kansas St. Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2026 at the Hope Coliseum.

Photo by: All Pro Photography/Dale Sparks

January 27, 2026 11:29 PM | Men's Basketball

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By: John Antonik

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia outscored Kansas State 14-5 over the remaining 4:30 to defeat the Wildcats 59-54 in a back-and-forth game tonight at Hope Coliseum.

Scoring came in spurts for both teams.

K-State tallied the game's first seven points and led by eight with 11:00 left in the first half. West Virginia, which began the game making just two of its first 13 field goal attempts, connected on its next six in a row and used a 21-9 run over the final 8:37 to take a 28-22 lead into the locker room at halftime.

Then, after West Virginia built a 36-26 lead in the first five minutes of the second half, Kansas State answered with an 8-0 run and got another 8-0 spurt during a five-minute stretch to take a 49-45 lead with 4:30 left.

A Treysen Eaglestaff layup finally broke the Mountaineers' seven-minute drought, and he then added a big 3 with 2:08 remaining to put them back in the lead, 50-49.

Chance Moore added a free throw with 1:45 to go and Honor Huff knocked down a step-back 3 with 34 seconds later to put West Virginia ahead 57-52.

P.J. Haggerty, who scored all 16 of his points in the second half, answered with a 3 before Eaglestaff responded with a traditional three-point play when he put back his own miss and was fouled by Nate Johnson on the play.

Eaglestaff made the free throw and Huff tacked on two more charities with eight seconds left to help secure West Virginia's 14^th victory of the season and its fifth in Big 12 play.

"I thought the play of the game was Trey's offensive rebound putback-and-one," West Virginia coach Ross Hodge said afterward. "I think that speaks to his growth as a player, as a competitor and as a winner."

Huff led the Mountaineers with 17 points, Eaglestaff contributed 12 and nine rebounds while Brenen Lorient added 10.

Kansas State scored 18 points off of 13 West Virginia turnovers to offset the Mountaineers' 38-31 advantage on the glass.

Jasper Floyd, who drew the assignment of guarding Haggerty tonight, held the nation's fifth-leading scorer to seven points below his season average. The last time Haggerty posted a scoreless first half was against Hodge's North Texas team last year.

David Castillo scored 15 and Johnson had 13 for Kansas State, which drops to 10-11 overall and 1-7 in league play.

Tonight's victory snapped K-State's three-game winning streak in the series.

"This one might be my favorite win so far as a group because of what it took collectively and from a belief standpoint to get off to that bad of a start and that many sloppy periods of play and then to keep fighting and keep believing," Hodge observed. "That's the mark of a good team."

Hodge said beforehand on his pregame radio show that he had a feeling tonight's game was going to be a difficult one for his team.

"The trip back (from Arizona) the weather was bad, and on Sunday and Monday, we really condensed (the team's preparation) to the middle of the day," he explained. "Kansas State has been close in a lot of games, and their record is not indicative of what they can be. We knew they were going to come in with a lot of fight, and I just had a feel that this one could be a grind."

West Virginia remains tied with UCF in seventh place in the Big 12 standings with a Saturday afternoon game looming against Baylor this Saturday.