Taz Sherman Gives West Virginia a Much Needed Offensive Boost

Has West Virginia found a guy to make shots?

Another road game, another road loss for West Virginia. 

This time, however, the Mountaineers faced the nation's top ranked team and potentially a national title contender in Baylor. Although it may seem like the Mountaineers got punched in the gut repeatedly, there were some bright spots that fans can point to for a sign of hope to get things turned around. One of those signs comes from junior, Taz Sherman who hit six three-pointers off of the bench.

The Mountaineers at one point trailed by as many as 28 points, but were able to close the gap to eleven by the time the final buzzer sounded. A big part of that semi-comeback was the emergence of Sherman on the offensive end of the floor. Head coach Bob Huggins referred to Sherman earlier in the year as the team's best shooter and certainly the team's best tough shot maker. It doesn't matter if Sherman is wide open, double-teamed or has a tightly contested shot - he has confidence that he can tickle the twine.

"My teammates found me and they put me in the right positions to make shots. I just knew that something had to change and I knew I just had to start picking up the scoring or it was going to be a worse deficit than it already was," Sherman said in the postgame.

West Virginia has potentially one of the best front-courts in all of college basketball with Derek Culver and Oscar Tshiebwe. The problem is - you can't just run everything through them, you have to have someone that can make jumpers and even threes from time to time. Teams have picked up on what West Virginia wants to do and they're clamping down on allowing anything in the paint. If Sherman can continue to make shots and be a consistent contributor to the offense, it allows things to open up and the big fellas underneath should have more wiggle room to work. When you don't have anyone who can hit a jump shot, it's a pretty easy offense to defend.

With just six games remaining in the regular season, the Mountaineers sit at 6-6 in Big 12 Conference play. If they want to get a top three or four seed in the conference tournament, they will need guys like Taz Sherman to make shots and create offense to combat what they want to do with the twin towers underneath. 

Has West Virginia found an offensive weapon? Let us know your thoughts in the comment section below!