Stock Up, Stock Down: Seini's Surge, Physicality + More From WVU's Win Over Mercer

West Virginia improved to 3-0 on Thursday night, taking down Mercer, but it was far from a stroll in the park. It can be somewhat of a wake-up call for the Mountaineers and one that maybe they needed before heading out to Las Vegas.

Let's jump right into it — here's our latest WVU basketball stock report.

Stock Up: Amadou Seini

He only had four points and four rebounds on the evening, but man, his impact felt greater than that, and that has been the theme throughout these first three games of the regular season. For someone who most considered a "late-bloomer" and a "project," he's looking like far from it.

He is going to get better, and I don't think it will be long before he's pushing Mouhamed Sylla for the starting spot. At the very least, those two will end up splitting minutes. They each bring something to the table, but when the Mountaineers need to shore things up on the glass and in the paint, Seini will be inserted into the game.

Stock Down: Physicality/Offensive Rebounding

West Virginia gave up zero offensive rebounds to Niagara and 11 to Stetson, so giving up 15 to an extremely undersized team definitely gets your attention, but there's no reason to sound the alarm just yet. Personally, it looked like the effort and the want-to were non-existent at times — guys sort of just going through the motions against another team they knew they would beat by double digits. That being said, it showed up in the second half of the exhibition against Maryland and at times throughout the night against Stetson.

With Amadou Seini and Mo Sylla, the Mountaineers should gobble up a boatload of rebounds, specifically on the defensive end. That said, the guards, wings, and Brenen Lorient have to play with more physicality and not let their man drive it deep into the paint or out-hustle them for an offensive rebound.

Stock Down: Shot Creation

Because the three-ball was dropping at a high clip in the first two games, the Mountaineers didn't really have to work for a bucket, at least not like they had to on Thursday night. When WVU had to run its halfcourt offense, which was most of the game, the ball didn't pop around as quickly as Ross Hodge probably would have liked, and there weren't many successful actions away from the ball. Miles Sadler did his thing, but someone other than him has to be able to get others open and make things happen with the ball in their hands.

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