--West Virginia has now lost six of seven and its season seems as if its quickly spinning out of control. It’s one thing to struggle on the road, but the Mountaineers lost this one at home and it’s quickly becoming the same recipe game after game. Missed shots, defensive lapses and effort were all culprits in this one. We’re not 21 days since the Mountaineers were projected as a No. 2 seed in the first bracket preview and this doesn’t even seem like the same season, forget the same damn month. This team just seems like a shell of the one that played for the first half of the year and it seems that almost every part of it has gotten worse has the year has gone along. There is something wrong with this team and it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what it is or a combination of things but there should be a real concern that they might not win a game for the rest of the season. This team is now 19-10 and 7-9 in the Big 12, which means they’ll have to win at least the last two to even draw .500 in conference play.
--That’s not to say there wasn’t some questionable decisions with the lineups either as West Virginia used some groups that quite literally had two scorers on the court at the same time. The decisions to use Brandon Knapper and Logan Routt were curious as well. Knapper was -9 in 9 minutes.
--West Virginia didn’t score over the final 5:43 of the first half and allowed Oklahoma to seize a 25-21 halftime lead after leading 21-18. Things didn’t get much better in the second half as the Sooners used defensive lapses to take a 36-27 lead only 3:02 in the second half. Oklahoma controlled things for the rest of the game until a furious rally cut things to 8 points but it was too little too late.
--Sophomore Derek Culver was 2-11 in this game and all of those outside of one was either in the paint or right outside of it. He was seemingly just throwing the ball at the rim at times and was really searching for anything to go in the basket. The Mountaineers were 10-19 on layups and Culver certainly played a role in that as finishing around the rim remains an issue. Culver is now 8-23 from the foul line over his last four games. He finished -13 for the game.
--Over the last three games, West Virginia is 28-55 from the free throw line. That is 51-percent. Woof. This team is now 63-percent for the season.
--Over the last four games, West Virginia is 11-69 from three-point range. That’s 16-percent. The leading three-point shooters on the entire team at Sean McNeil and Taz Sherman at 32.5-percent. They’re also the only players on the roster shooting over 30-percent from deep. Of those 11 makes, 9 have come from McNeil or Sherman meaning that the rest of the team has made 2-37 in that span.
--On the plus side of things it was nice to see Miles McBride snap out of a recent funk and hit 5-13 from the field and really lead the come back down the stretch. But too little too late.
--West Virginia was +14 on the offensive glass but that only resulted in +5 in second chance points. The Mountaineers were only +6 in points on the paint.
--The Mountaineers had only 10 assists on 24 made baskets.
--West Virginia was +44 in shot attempts in the two meetings against Oklahoma but lost both games by double-figures. I don’t even know how that’s possible.
--The Mountaineers only turned the ball over seven times.
--Since shooting 50-percent against Iowa State, West Virginia has shot 35-percent or below four of the seven games since then.
--West Virginia will now hit the road to try to avoid losing eight of nine conference games in that fashion against Iowa State Tuesday. This team is desperate for a win, any type of win, and this could be the last chance remaining because there is a real possibility this club could fall completely out of the top six in the league and avoid getting a bye in the first round of the conference tournament. Buckle up because this team was 18-4 and you could realistically see a finish of 19-13 heading into selection Sunday if they can’t find a way to generate any type of momentum at all.
--That’s not to say there wasn’t some questionable decisions with the lineups either as West Virginia used some groups that quite literally had two scorers on the court at the same time. The decisions to use Brandon Knapper and Logan Routt were curious as well. Knapper was -9 in 9 minutes.
--West Virginia didn’t score over the final 5:43 of the first half and allowed Oklahoma to seize a 25-21 halftime lead after leading 21-18. Things didn’t get much better in the second half as the Sooners used defensive lapses to take a 36-27 lead only 3:02 in the second half. Oklahoma controlled things for the rest of the game until a furious rally cut things to 8 points but it was too little too late.
--Sophomore Derek Culver was 2-11 in this game and all of those outside of one was either in the paint or right outside of it. He was seemingly just throwing the ball at the rim at times and was really searching for anything to go in the basket. The Mountaineers were 10-19 on layups and Culver certainly played a role in that as finishing around the rim remains an issue. Culver is now 8-23 from the foul line over his last four games. He finished -13 for the game.
--Over the last three games, West Virginia is 28-55 from the free throw line. That is 51-percent. Woof. This team is now 63-percent for the season.
--Over the last four games, West Virginia is 11-69 from three-point range. That’s 16-percent. The leading three-point shooters on the entire team at Sean McNeil and Taz Sherman at 32.5-percent. They’re also the only players on the roster shooting over 30-percent from deep. Of those 11 makes, 9 have come from McNeil or Sherman meaning that the rest of the team has made 2-37 in that span.
--On the plus side of things it was nice to see Miles McBride snap out of a recent funk and hit 5-13 from the field and really lead the come back down the stretch. But too little too late.
--West Virginia was +14 on the offensive glass but that only resulted in +5 in second chance points. The Mountaineers were only +6 in points on the paint.
--The Mountaineers had only 10 assists on 24 made baskets.
--West Virginia was +44 in shot attempts in the two meetings against Oklahoma but lost both games by double-figures. I don’t even know how that’s possible.
--The Mountaineers only turned the ball over seven times.
--Since shooting 50-percent against Iowa State, West Virginia has shot 35-percent or below four of the seven games since then.
--West Virginia will now hit the road to try to avoid losing eight of nine conference games in that fashion against Iowa State Tuesday. This team is desperate for a win, any type of win, and this could be the last chance remaining because there is a real possibility this club could fall completely out of the top six in the league and avoid getting a bye in the first round of the conference tournament. Buckle up because this team was 18-4 and you could realistically see a finish of 19-13 heading into selection Sunday if they can’t find a way to generate any type of momentum at all.
