WVU falling back into bad habits heading into crucial road game against Oklahoma State

MORGANTOWN — In the moments that followed its 82-76 overtime loss against Kansas State on Saturday, it was clear the WVU men’s basketball team had hit a moment of truth.

Gone was the early-season talk of players getting in the gym and working hard.

Gone was the talk of how this bunch of Mountaineers were older, more mature and battled-tested through their journeys through other Power Five Conferences.

WVU STATS

And there were no discussions on how this WVU team was different, because it was more capable of scoring points and had more talented players up and down the roster.

That was all fine and dandy when it was still November and the opponents were Morehead State, Navy and Mount St. Mary’s.

It wasn’t fine against the Wildcats, a team with a new head coach and 13 new players brought in by Jerome Tang either through recruiting or the transfer portal.

In the span of a 45-minute game, the Mountaineers (10-3, 0-1 Big 12) went from feel-good to questionable.

WVU point guard Kedrian Johnson shouldered the blame for the loss. Not for his off shooting night, but rather for his inability to clamp down on Kansas State point guard Markquis Nowell, who dominated the second half to finish with 23 points and 10 assists.

Nowell was, “Playing small, got in tight spaces, got in gaps, but it’s me, so I can guard anybody in the country. That starts with me,” Johnson said. “I feel like I can guard anybody. It was just me, you know, my lack of awareness at some points. I allowed him to back-cut me, make plays. So I put a lot of weight on my shoulders for this loss.”

There was so much more blame to go around, including how a team that played a majority of seniors or fifth-year seniors in this game could turn the ball over a season-high 20 times in it’s conference opener.

“Twenty turnovers, 20,” WVU head coach Bob Huggins began. “We’ve had numerous conversations about how we excessively turn the ball over and do stupid things, and we did some stupid things today, just turned the game over.”

Older teams filled with “men” — the word used by Huggins to describe his team in the days leading up to the game — generally don’t do stupid things again and again, yet Huggins used that turn of phrase more than once to describe what happened against K-State.

“We seemingly had the game under control and then we had some guys do some really stupid things that enabled them to get back into the game,” Huggins said. “They know what they did.”

Along with the 20 turnovers, WVU also missed 18 free throws, a topic that had Huggins question how much work his team puts in, which is a direct contradiction to what was said earlier in the season.

“The season started out and they were in the gym,” Huggins said. “I was in my office and would hear the balls bouncing and we’ve got guys down there. They weren’t killing themselves, but they’re down there shooting free throws and working on jump hooks. I don’t see them anymore.”

The sudden change of atmosphere around the Mountaineers is relevant, because the program is still trying to recover from the 2021-22 season that saw WVU finish in last place in the Big 12 and miss out on postseason play.

That season, too, saw WVU get off to a feel-good start, only to have it come crashing down once conference play began.

That season was also a game-by-game example of not playing good defense, watching opponents score in the paint almost at will and turning the ball over at an alarming rate.

Or, basically everything bad that happened Saturday against Kansas State.

“For the most part, it was just a lack of awareness and not wanting to take care of the ball,” is how Johnson described it. “Just out there just moving around, not paying attention, just being careless for the most part.”

The Mountaineers are now off to Gallagher-Iba Arena to face Oklahoma State (8-5, 0-1) at 7 p.m. Monday, and the Cowboys will likely be in some sort of way after narrowly missing out on an upset of Kansas.

Kansas forward K.J. Adams scored on a driving lay-up with three seconds remaining to give the Jayhawks a 69-67 victory.

Huggins called Oklahoma State “super athletic,” and referred to Gallagher-Iba Arena as one of the most difficult places to play in the Big 12, despite WVU being 6-4 there since joining the Big 12.

WVU has put itself in a bind, especially considering the team will return to Morgantown only to face nationally-ranked Kansas and Baylor after facing Oklahoma State.

The opportunity is there to turn things around with a mighty bang, but the talk coming out of the Kansas State loss was more thud than bang.

“I don’t understand how you can say you love the game and not embrace the game,” Huggins said. “I don’t know how you can say you love the game and everything that comes out is more about you than the game. It makes no sense.”

TWEET @bigjax3211