Ross Hodge Discusses the Loss and Chance Moore's Debut

The West Virginia Mountaineers (5-1) dropped their first game of the season Friday night 70-67 to the Clemson Tigers (5-1).

West Virginia head coach Ross Hodge met with the Mountaineers and broke down the Mountaineers’ loss and discussed senior forward Chance Moore’s debut.

Opening statement

I want to congratulate coach Brownell and his team. Had a lot of respect for those guys coming in. In my opinion, he’s one of the more underrated coaches in college basketball. Had all the traits of a good team – tough, physical, smart, disciplined.

On our end, we felt like it was really just a tale of two half’s, simply put. You look at the first half, we held them to 25 points. They shot 37% from the floor, 15% from three, and then, the second half it flipped. We gave up 45 points. They shoot 56% from two and 55% from three, and four us, it’s not typically a recipe for success. I would imagine a lot of that 45 came in the last eight minutes of the game.

Simply put, I felt like down the stretch they were able to execute at a higher level than we were. They got the ball where they wanted it – they finished. We had a hard time getting the ball where we wanted it and when we did, we didn’t finish. So, I think you have to give them a ton of credit.

Disappointed for us, disappointed for everybody that traveled down here. I mean, at times it felt like a home game. So, certainly want to thank our fans and everybody that made the trip. Fortunate enough that we don’t have to sit on this one too long and we get a chance to play another really good team on Sunday.

Chance Moore making his WVU debut – scored 16 points, grabbed five rebounds in 24 minutes

I was just going to kind of let the game dictate where it took. Obviously, he’s one of the better players on the floor and some of those other guys weren’t having their best nights and I thought his physicality in a game like this and his ability to drive the ball downhill was a big deal.

He had done a good job of staying ready – kept himself in good shape. He was able to play in our closed-door exhibition and he was able to play in our exhibition, so it was five games, but it was only about 13 days. So, it was nice to have him back for sure.

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