West Virginia forward Quinn Slazinski, 11, shoots Cincinnati forward Cal Ezikpe, 1, during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game on Tuesday, March 12, 2024 in Kansas City, Missouri. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)
After being thoroughly embarrassed in a 36-point loss to Cincinnati, 92-56, in the final game of the regular season, West Virginia tied again with the Bearcats in the Big 12 Tournament opener, with interim coach Josh Eilert as head coach. He wanted to ensure his tenure as The coach didn't just cry again.
The coach kept the fire burning in the Mountaineers' locker room for the intervening two days to elicit an emotional, physical, and passionate response from his team, but as the team was burned with three technical fouls. , I guess I turned up the heat too much. Within the first four minutes of the second half, the Bearcats went on a rampage, erasing a 16-point lead against WVU and defeating the Mountaineers 90-85.
Before the game, Eilert, who replaced Bob Huggins and had the worst season in Mountaineers history with a 9-23 record, showed his players how happy he was when Cincinnati scored 56 seconds into the game. , revealed that he and his staff challenged the players. At the last meeting we had half a point to light the fuse.
“They showed us on film how Cincinnati was dancing on the sideline, having so much fun that we were disappointed. If they had a competitive bone in their body, they'd be mad and come out here and take revenge.” “We will try to do that,” Eilert said.
“I want to see the fire in their eyes from the jump.”
The problem was that when WVU started the second half with a strong run and Kobe Johnson made a difficult shot inside with 12 minutes left to score 12 points and take a 64-48 lead, the flames he set were out of control. It turned out that it was. -4 The mountaineer runs.
But the basket wasn't enough for Johnson. Seconds later, officials hit him with a “T for taunt and technical and two free throws.”
It also stood for “Too bad.”
Perhaps this is an appropriate time to note that the hosting staff was led by Kip Kissinger. What more needs to be said?
In addition to Kobe Johnson, both Requan Battle and Jesse Edwards received technical fouls, with four fouls each.
At the moment of Johnson's technical foul, the Flames jumped from bench to bench. You could almost see the Bearcats light up when Simas Lukocious made two free throws and a 3 moments later.
“At the end of the day, it was a discipline issue,” Eilert said. “The parade to the free-throw line, the things we can control, the discipline in not getting technical fouls, the six points at the line, the key moments where we had momentum and it just went away. ” Momentum. ”
It was a precursor to things to come for Lukocious, who finished with 30 points, including 8-of-13 shooting from the floor and 7-of-12 from 3-point range. Day Day Thomas joined the team late in the game, scoring 29 points on 10-of-18 shooting and 7-of-10 from 3-point range.
The pair made 15 of the 16 threes that WVU's defense obliterated, marking the fifth game in the last 10 games in which the Mountaineers have allowed 90 or more points.
A complete reversal from the style they played in Cincinnati, where the Bearcats scored 48 points in the paint. This time they bothered to go inside and the Mountaineers outscored them 36-20 in the paint, but between 16 threes and a six-point difference from three technical points, it was too much for WVU to dig out. The hole was too deep.
“We looked at the box score and told them we needed to change our game plan from Saturday’s performance, and we certainly did that and figured out ways to toughen up the paint, but at the end of the day Well, credit to them for stepping up and making shot after shot,'' Eilert said in the postgame interview.
Offense wasn't the problem for WVU, as it was throughout the final few weeks of the season.
In this loss, he had a FG success rate of 55%, and in the past five games he lost, he had a FG success rate of 52.9%, averaging 76.4 points per game.
In fact, this final game was one of the most entertaining of the season, filled not only with excitement on the floor from both teams, but with heroes on both benches battling through 18 lead changes.
At WVU, Jesse Edwards showed the way in his final game as a Mountaineer, scoring 17 points on 7-of-8 shooting, while Quinn Slazinski played in what will likely be his last game at the school. He participated and recorded 15 points and 7 rebounds.
Battle had 14 points, Kerr Kriisa had 13 points, Jojo Harris had 10 points, WVU had five double-digit points and Kobe Johnson had eight clutch points.
But in the end, there was just too much Lukocious and Thomas and not enough defense for the Mountaineers.
