WVU travels to Texas Tech with potential Baylor sequence now in jeopardy | University Athletics
MORGANTOWN — Perfectly, you all are just heading to have to wait for what was going to be the highlight of West Virginia’s basketball period, as COVID-19 has stepped in once more and thrown the plan entirely out of kilter. The Mountaineers’ back-to-back showdown in opposition to No. 2 Baylor — originally element of this operate of facing 6 consecutive Major 25 teams — has been postponed.
The unbeaten Bears, who presently had its to start with matchup with WVU on Jan. 12 postponed the moment, had been penciled in to encounter WVU on Feb. 15 in Morgantown and Feb . 18 in Waco. But a COVID-19 outbreak has remaining the Bears not able to meet up with Large 12 protocols, forcing each matchups to be postponed.
Now WVU’s attention had not nonetheless turned to Baylor, as the Mountaineers first have a Tuesday 9 p.m. assembly with No. 7 Texas Tech in Lubbock and then a Saturday 1 p.m. Coliseum date in opposition to No. 12 Oklahoma.
The Texas Tech video game is a rematch of one particular of the year’s most fascinating video games. WVU gained the first assembly when Deuce McBride scored with 6 seconds remaining to give the Mountaineers an 88-87 direct just before they survived when the Pink Raiders’ prime scorer, Mac McClung, skipped a buzzer beater at the other conclude of the court.
With the two Baylor online games now in limbo, WVU has 4 contests that should be rescheduled, as it nevertheless has postponed online games from TCU and Oklahoma Point out that have not yet been supplied a new date.
The Large 12 did go away a 7 days open up among the conclusion of the common year and the get started of the Major 12 Event in March to play make-up online games, but it would be nearly extremely hard to participate in four games in that time. And if you are contemplating of having people TCU and Oklahoma State online games and fitting them into the new Baylor openings, that would not function for those two groups who previously have games scheduled.
WVU coach Bob Huggins just isn’t guaranteed how it will perform out.
“All I know is we have been told that every single effort and hard work will be produced to enjoy all the league online games,” he claimed.
If they reside up to that and squeeze a few video games into the previous open 7 days, WVU could capture a crack and perform a few dwelling game titles the last 7 days in advance of heading into the Big 12 Tournament, a important point taking into consideration the complications journey offers for the Mountaineers.
For example, WVU will not return household from this vacation to Lubbock right up until about 5 a.m., with courses and research halls on tap the subsequent day.
It is really a combat Huggins has fought above and more than, primarily when owning to engage in a 9 p.m. sport in the Central Time Zone with an all-night time flight shedding an hour forward of them. But it is a struggle he has not gained but.
“We are using it just one at a time and striving to get ready as ideal we can,” Huggins reported. “That is the thing about this league, you you should not get any breaks. We engage in a game like we played against Kansas, choose a day, and then have to travel. You search at other leagues and there are people you engage in wherever you say, ‘Well, we do not have to be at the leading of our activity when we perform just one of these teams at house.’
“But I am just sitting right here observing Kansas Condition versus Texas Tech, and K-State gave them a heck of a match. And shoot, they are at the base of our league. Then Iowa Condition just loses by four at Oklahoma, and Oklahoma is quite excellent. You glimpse at Iowa State scores and they have been in most of their online games.”
In the meantime, WVU has to acquire care of business enterprise in Lubbock against Texas Tech, with the Mountaineers buoyed by the victory Saturday from Kansas as very well as McBride’s the freshly-named Big 12 Player of the Week honors just after he scored 31 details against the Jayhawks.
Texas Tech is definitely plenty of to fear about, primarily when carrying a grudge immediately after that challenging decline in Morgantown.
Huggins explained he won’t approach to do anything at all new defensively, even though McClung scored 30 and Tech set 87 on the board. McClung was slowed down by Oklahoma through Tech’s previous time out, but Huggins didn’t see just about anything he’d want to replicate.
“When scorers have a negative night it can be usually a blend of matters,” Huggins explained. “Oklahoma had anything to do with it, but you really don’t shoot perfectly just about every match, no a person does. It was a mixture of him not taking pictures effectively and them playing properly.”
As for generating team adjustments, Huggins thinks that is previously been attained.
“I think we’re much better now defensively than we had been in the initially recreation,” he mentioned. “I sort of like where by we have been from Kansas.”
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