West Virginia Needs to Prove Recent Hangovers Are in the Past
Whether you cosign Bob Huggins' post game comments after West Virginia soundly defeated Iowa State at home last night, it's hard to argue that the Mountaineers were never totally in control of the game. In what has become a central theme of the 2019-2020 season, West Virginia once again defended its mountain stronghold and improved its home win total to 12-0. Simply put, when Derek Culver, Oscar Tshiebwe and co. suit up under the dome of the Coliseum, they're lining up for a win.
So what about those four losses on the season?
An equally prominent trend this season that runs in direct opposition to West Virginia's juggernaut status at home as that it cannot (aside from Ohio State) seem to grab a win on the road. It's puzzling and, it goes without saying, frustrating to see play out. For a team gifted with such a wealth of size, depth and intensity, why does West Virginia continue to look hobbled on the road?
I won't discount how tough of a league the Big 12 is. As of today, four of the top-25 teams in the NCAA NET rankings (Baylor, Kansas, West Virginia, Texas Tech) are all in the Big-12. Additionally, with only 10 teams sitting around the table, there is no other D-1 power league that is more prone to cannibalizing itself by season's end. That said, West Virginia has had chances. Good ones, at that. Three of the Mountaineers' losses were by a combined 17 point margin and the fourth, an absolute drubbing by Kansas State in Manhattan, looks more and more like a fluke as the season wears on.
So after a convincing win over Iowa State last night, can we expect a victory hangover as West Virginia travels to Norman, OK to face the Sooners? It's a fair question, given that three of the Mountaineers' aforementioned losses came on the heels of wins, most notably an 81-49 carpet-bombing of TCU. While the Mountaineers aren't painting High Street red after capturing a win, they're prone to hangovers nonetheless. That's the issue at play, here. Chalk it up to youthful indiscretion and the pitfalls of being young and talented, or label it a hazard of the thousands of miles West Virginia logs as part of its conference travel schedule. What really matters is that it's a problem and it needs to be fixed and fast.
Oklahoma, for its part, isn't having a terrible year. The Sooners currently sit at 14-8 and are 5th in the Big 12 standings and have home wins over Mississippi State, TCU, Kansas State, Oklahoma State and only fell to Kansas by six points. Like Iowa State, they are buoyed by a pair of very solid players in Brady Manek and Austin Reaves. They do not, however, have a hallmark win to lean on come March. They're also just a generally unspectacular team that doesn't have much depth.
So for West Virginia, it's an opportunity to get the road monkey off its back and build some considerable momentum before a rematch with Kansas and a road trip down to Waco to play the top-ranked Baylor Bears. Like we saw against Iowa State and have previously seen in wins over Texas and TCU, West Virginia needs to be the aggressor from the opening tip, lean on its two bigs in the paint and, oh-so-simply, hit its shots. It's a simple formula that they possess the raw materials to complete.
With only four home games left in the regular season, the Mountaineers can ill-afford to continue blanking outside of Morgantown lest they slip further and further down the rankings and miss out on a 3rd-or-higher seeding in the NCAA tournament. Is the sudden resurgence of both Emmitt Matthews, Jr. and Jordan McCabe enough to fuel West Virginia as it makes several more trips down into the heartland? Is Derek Culver actually made of folded steel? Who knows, but it sure can't hurt.
For a team that has all the tools to battle deep into the tournament come March, the lone line item left on West Virginia's to-do list is glaring. Time to start buttoning things up on Saturday down in Norman.
