Everything Ross Hodge Said Following the 29-Point Defeat to Houston

See what the head Mountaineer had to say about last night's loss.

Jan 13, 2026; Houston, Texas, USA; West Virginia Mountaineers head coach Ross Hodge reacts while watching the Mountaineers play against the Houston Cougars in the first half at Fertitta Center. Mandatory Credit: Thomas Shea-Imagn Images | Thomas Shea-Imagn Images

Tuesday night's game against No. 7 Houston is one the West Virginia Mountaineers will want to forget as soon as possible. And they'll have to move on quickly as they return to the floor on Saturday at home against Colorado.

Following the blowout loss, head coach Ross Hodge met with the media for a brief postgame press conference. Here's everything he had to say.

Opening statement

“I’m going to give Coach (Kelvin) Sampson and his staff and his team a ton of credit. That was a good old-fashioned tail whippin’. There’s a reason they are who they are. It starts with their level of physicality and their ability to do simple things at an incredibly high rate. I didn’t think we played very well. I didn’t think we had a great start, but they had a lot to do with that. I liked how we stayed together as a group, but I don’t think our fight, our toughness, and our defensive execution weren’t at a high enough level.”

The offensive struggles in the first half

“They make it so hard on you to get quality looks. And then when you do get a couple of quality looks, you feel the squeeze, and you don’t get them to go down. I thought during that stretch we were able to turn the corner a couple times, and we short-armed some layups at the basket. You go to the foul line, and you miss two free throws, and then Honor (Huff) had a couple fairly clean looks in that stretch. It was 33-18 at the half, and if you make one three, make those two free throws, and make a layup, now it’s 33-25, and it feels a little different. When you don’t get off to the good start, then you start feeling the squeeze, and that’s what elite defenses do to you. When you do get an open look, you’re surprised and rush it a little bit.”

What the team can take from this game

“I thought our togetherness was good. Even in the midst of a difficult game and difficult stretches, I thought our communication during huddles and timeouts was good enough. What you would like to get from a visual standpoint is if someone was just watching your team play, they wouldn’t know if you were up or down, just by judging your body language, your tight huddles in free throws, your collective togetherness. I just didn’t think the five guys that were actually in the game, I didn’t think our fight and our execution, and maybe even a little bit of belief, which starts with myself. To come in here to win is very difficult to do, and you’ve got to have multiple guys play very well, and we just didn’t. That’s life in the Big 12.”

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