Is It Time for WVU to Shake Up the Starting Lineup to Spark Better Starts?

As we discussed in-depth earlier this morning, West Virginia has to find a way to play more efficient basketball to open up games. Five of their nine league games have resulted in these "slow starts" where they are trailing at the half by an average of 7.8 points.

WVU head coach Ross Hodge talked about the issue at length during his press conference on Tuesday and admitted he hasn't identified one exact reason for the sluggish beginnings.

"If it was just kind of like one person that you felt like was creating slow starts, well, maybe you wouldn't start that person," Hodge said. "But it's kind of been a little bit of everybody's had their hand in it, and obviously we've talked about it and have looked at it specifically, like, hey, is it something particular that's causing it, and haven't kind of settled in on one thing in particular just other than needing to get off to better starts.”

I'm going to go against Hodge's theory of rolling out the same starting five, for just a moment. I'm not guaranteeing it would fix the issue, but it wouldn't hurt to give it a shot, right?

My idea? Start Amir Jenkins

Jasper Floyd is a guard who likes to slow things down, control the tempo, and play at his own pace. It's fine to have that offensive approach. However, to help create that extra sense of urgency that is so clearly lacking at the start of games, swapping him out for Amir Jenkins makes a lot of sense.

Offensively, you're not really losing much, if anything. Even as a true freshman, Jenkins has shown the ability to run the offense and occasionally knock down some shots. Hodge even mentioned the other day that the pace tends to pick up when he and/or Chance Moore are in the game.

The idea could be to start Moore, but I'm not sure who he would replace. You don't want Honor Huff, Treysen Eaglestaff, or Brenen Lorient coming off the bench, so Jenkins over Floyd makes more sense, especially since he's the guy who controls the pace.

Making this move doesn't necessarily mean Floyd's role or minutes will decrease either. You're just looking for ways to avoid a double-digit deficit early. Once guys settle into the game and the offense has some stuff going, then you can make the switch to Floyd to slow things down and control the pace.

My idea? Start Amir Jenkins

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