Huggins Wants More Consistency Following Win Over Northeastern
The No. 9 West Virginia Mountaineers (8-2) dominated the inside, tallying 50 points in the paint behind the efforts of forwards Derek Culver and Oscar Tshiebwe to knocked off the Northeastern Huskies 73-51 Tuesday afternoon.
Culver ripped off 10 points in the first five minutes of the game to give the Mountaineers an early 15-10 advantage. Then, Tshiebwe got into the mix, cleaning the boards with 10 big first half rebounds and added eight points.
Tshiebwe came into the game averaging just 8.1 points and 7.0 rebounds per game after averaging 11.2 and 9.3 during his freshman campaign but recorded his first double double of the season with 12 points and 15 rebounds as Culver led all scorers with 18 points.
“They’re two talented guys. Derek has come a long way offensively. Oscar has struggled a little bit early, but I think he is starting to come out of it from an offensive standpoint,” said West Virginia head coach Bob Huggins.
West Virginia led by eight at the half before Northeastern’s Tyson Walker buried a three out of the break and a steal with a lay-in on the other end, quickly cutting the Mountaineers lead down to three. Tshiebwe responded with a couple of baskets underneath, and Emmitt Matthews, Jr. drove the lane from the elbow to give the Mountaineers a 6-0 spurt and ignite a 13-3 run to regain a double point advantage at the 14:48 mark of the second half.
Huggins rotated his younger, inexperienced players into the game, a group that hasn’t gotten many minutes, got plenty of playing time, and, despite greenness, showed flashes of their potential.
“Well, they didn’t pass the ball. It was kind of like open gym; it was whoever got it shot it, which was not what we were looking for," Huggins said of his younger Mountaineers. "We are looking for them to continue to running offense, continue taking good shots… We don’t pass it well, and we don’t pass it often enough.”
The Mountaineers amped up their defense and ran the Huskies off the three-point line while building upon their double point advantage to cruise to a 22-point victory, 73-51. However, Huggins is still looking for consistency.
“I think we got a long way to go. We’re not consistent enough, you know. We would get up to 13 or 14 then all of a sudden, it’s six again because we didn’t get a rebound and they got a second shot, or we fumbled the ball; we just got to be more consistent,” he said.
West Virginia heads to Norman, OK, to take on the Oklahoma Sooners this Saturday at 4:00 pm EST on ESPN2.
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