Mountaineers Now Postgame Show: BYU Pulls Away Late to Beat WVU
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00:00 [MUSIC]
00:10 Hello everyone and welcome into the Mountaineers now post game show presented
00:14 by Country Roads Air Duct Cleaning.
00:15 Take me home to comfort West Virginia falling to BYU 86 to 73 tonight.
00:21 A look at the numbers here from this game.
00:24 Jesse Edwards had 16.7 boards and two blocks.
00:28 Kurt Creasa led the way for West Virginia with 23 points.
00:31 And it was Fousey Traore who had 24.9 boards for BYU,
00:38 who filled into the starting lineup and absolutely dominated West Virginia
00:43 in the pay despite only being a 6'6" or 6'7" guy.
00:47 But BYU as a team, they shot 13 of 36 from three.
00:51 And Chris, I mean, this was pretty much what we expected from BYU, right?
00:56 I mean, this is a team that lives and dies by the three.
00:58 They're going to make a lot of shots.
00:59 They're going to make a lot of tough contested shots.
01:02 But to me, that's not really where the game was lost,
01:05 even though there were some lapses on that end of the floor.
01:07 To me, it's West Virginia's offense.
01:10 It's either they swing the ball, they move it, and they are efficient
01:15 in that kind of a setting, or they try to go ISO all the time
01:18 and they can't find a shot.
01:20 And they also fell in love with the three ball.
01:22 For whatever reason, I guess maybe they tried to match BYU,
01:26 but they're just not a three-point shooting team,
01:28 and they went, what, 8 of 28 tonight?
01:31 So that's not necessarily the game plan you probably want to have.
01:36 No, they were aggressive at the beginning.
01:39 BYU blocked some shots and it scared them off.
01:42 And that's not the recipe to beat BYU.
01:44 If you look, every Big 12 team's doubled them up
01:47 at free throw attempts in every single game.
01:49 And West Virginia didn't take advantage of that.
01:51 They didn't get them in foul trouble.
01:53 And when you just – pretty much any team outside of BYU,
01:59 if you fall in love with jump shots, you're not going to win.
02:01 You've got to get to the line.
02:02 You've got to get them in foul trouble.
02:04 And they just never really took it to them.
02:07 And for whatever reason, you can kind of say there's blocked shots early,
02:11 but they didn't continue the path, and you're going to wind up losing
02:15 if you try to match shots with BYU.
02:17 Yeah, and it really hurt West Virginia too in the first half.
02:19 Jesse Edwards gets two fouls.
02:21 He has to sit in the first half.
02:22 That seems like it's becoming a theme.
02:24 I don't know what they're going to have to do
02:26 or what they're going to be able to do if he gets in foul trouble consistently
02:31 early in these games because it seems like the moment he goes out,
02:34 everything changes.
02:36 And that's no slight to Pat Somnick because he has played above –
02:40 well above expectations, but there is a clear, distinct advantage
02:43 in the paint and on the boards when he's out of the game.
02:46 And I think we really saw that tonight.
02:49 Pat's just not been the same.
02:50 I mean, Jesse got pushed around a lot.
02:51 A lot of that has to do with injury.
02:53 He missed a coach who was out with a medical condition.
02:56 I mean, you've just got to go get them in foul trouble.
02:58 I mean, it was right there.
03:00 It was easy, laid out for you.
03:03 Game plan should have been easy, just continue to attack,
03:06 and they just refused.
03:08 So if you're not willing to go make some contact and use a pump fake or two
03:13 if they're jumping up, and many are jumping up early.
03:15 I mean, one pump fake and they're going to think twice about doing it again.
03:18 So it was just all around a low IQ basketball moment for them today.
03:25 Just poor, poor execution.
03:27 Got to get – I mean, we can say it's chemistry, it's this and that,
03:31 but at some point you just have to play basketball.
03:33 And if you can't figure out pump fake to get these guys up in the air
03:37 and get them in foul trouble, then you're going to lose every game.
03:41 I mean, that's just – that's silly nonsense.
03:43 It's basketball 101.
03:44 They just got to be better, plain and simple.
03:47 Stop settling for jump shots, take the ball down low.
03:51 Jesse had the size advantage.
03:53 He should have been posed up, give the ball as many chances as you can.
03:59 Pat Sumnick was able to take advantage of it when they got to him.
04:02 So if you're not going to get it down low, drive the ball.
04:06 And if they do happen to collapse all on you, kick it out.
04:08 And they did that multiple times and got shots.
04:11 But just standing there and trying to lift up over guys
04:14 was not winning basketball.
04:17 And defensively they were slow again, lacked communication.
04:21 They got kind of in rhythm defensively when they were scoring.
04:25 And even at times when they were down 17 and they got to stop,
04:29 couldn't score, they were still playing defense.
04:31 But just got to him, and I think really that banked fluke shot
04:37 kind of was the dagger.
04:39 And the foul, it makes it on the foul.
04:41 You missed a free throw, but those are just prayers that went in.
04:45 So it's not your night, but you can control your own destiny
04:49 if you just stick to the game plan.
04:51 Yeah, I mean they got crushed off the dribble again.
04:53 I mean this is – it's been a reoccurring theme,
04:56 but I think specifically with this team,
04:59 if you're getting crushed off the dribble time and time again
05:03 and you're just kind of getting lazy with it after they blow by you,
05:07 that's when the three-point shots start to open up because then you think
05:10 they're just going to crash the basket.
05:12 All of a sudden they swing it and they kick it out, wide open three.
05:16 And these guys are not closing out.
05:17 They're not running them off the line.
05:19 I mean like we talked about it before the game.
05:22 I mean they have shot over 120-some more three-point attempts
05:27 than anybody else in the Big 12.
05:29 I mean this is what they live and die by.
05:31 Run them off the line.
05:33 They're still going to shoot their fair amount –
05:36 their fair amount of threes.
05:37 There's no question about that.
05:38 That's what they do.
05:39 But you have to know that.
05:41 There's way too many possessions where it just looked like they were lost
05:47 and they were surprised that they took a three.
05:49 I mean there's got to be communication.
05:51 They've got to be quicker.
05:53 There's got to be some movement.
05:55 And I don't know, I think they just –
05:57 getting crushed off the dribble is a big part of it.
05:59 Yeah, not getting back on defense and transition.
06:02 I mean they just didn't play well at all.
06:04 It's not the team that we've seen.
06:06 The Coliseum is a late.
06:08 So they got a week off to figure it out.
06:11 I would be hammering all those losses and looking and saying,
06:13 "Look, you're flat-footed as they're driving by you."
06:16 I can't even say what's possible.
06:18 Stop the ball.
06:20 It is one of the – it's not a surprise that they lose, it's how they lost.
06:25 And I think that's a little bit of a surprise considering how they played.
06:28 So you've got to figure it out.
06:29 I mean defensively they've just been atrocious at times
06:32 and today was one of those days where you're reacting
06:35 after they're already by you.
06:36 At that point it's over.
06:37 So I don't – slide down to the guy that's helping, slide down to his man,
06:41 because you're cooked.
06:43 And guys were open, they took advantage of the numbers,
06:46 and they're going to make open threes.
06:48 Yeah, I mean they got out to a lead as much of 17,
06:52 and it felt like West Virginia was just slowly chipping away.
06:56 And every time they chip, chip, chip, chip away,
06:58 BYU would make a ridiculous shot.
07:00 Like the step back three that he banked in, the three that he got fouled on,
07:04 I mean it was just one thing after another.
07:07 BYU somewhat had an answer as soon as that lead got trimmed down to about five,
07:11 six, or seven, they found a way.
07:14 Back to Torreira, because I want to get your take on this.
07:16 How does he have that kind of night?
07:18 Because I mean I understand Edwards was in foul trouble in the first half,
07:22 but in the second half he was scoring over Edwards.
07:25 I mean this is a guy that's seven inches smaller than Jesse,
07:29 and I get Jesse's probably trying to be careful with this foul situation,
07:34 but you can't let this kid go off for 20-some points.
07:39 He weighs more than Jesse.
07:40 He was able to carve out space just to get enough room to put it up on the rim,
07:43 and it went in.
07:44 I heard Huggins talk about it for years about center,
07:47 about the forwards that he had.
07:49 You have to get it up over a rim, and credit to him he did.
07:52 He just created enough space with his size that he was able to get it up over Jesse.
07:57 He weighs more than Jesse, and when you have a hurt wrist,
08:02 just take advantage of it.
08:04 That's a lot of credit to BYU.
08:05 They recognized it, just pushed him down in the paint,
08:07 threw it up over his hands and up on the rim, and it fell.
08:11 Sometimes you're on, sometimes you're not.
08:13 This is just one of those nights where pretty much everything BYU felt like
08:17 they threw up went in, but all you did was just get it up over the rim.
08:21 It's really that simple with him.
08:23 Get back, get him in, pushed him, did it to Pat as well.
08:27 Pat really had no excuse for it, but when you got a big, strong guy like that,
08:31 and they feel you on your back, push him back,
08:35 and they can make you look silly.
08:37 That's just good technique, and that's just good coaching
08:39 and good fundamentals by him.
08:42 Yes, so as you mentioned, West Virginia will have the next six days off.
08:46 Their next game is next Saturday at Texas,
08:50 who obviously will be looking to get their revenge
08:53 from that earlier season loss in Morgantown,
08:56 and then they'll turn right back around and play TCU and Fort Worth on Monday.
09:00 So two games in three days, that quick little trip out west
09:05 before coming back to play Baylor.
09:08 So tough road trip coming up here for West Virginia.
09:11 You feel like -- I mean, obviously at this point you've got to win
09:13 every game you can, but getting swept is definitely not ideal by any means.
09:19 So West Virginia falls tonight 86-73 to BYU, number 22 in the country,
09:26 and that'll do it for us tonight here on the Mountaineers Now postgame show,
09:30 presented by Country Roads Air Duct Cleaning.
09:32 We'll be back next week when West Virginia takes on the Texas Longhorns.
09:36 To recap, that one tips off at 3 o'clock Eastern time
09:40 on the Longhorn Network channel, which is also, I believe, on ESPN+.
09:45 So another stream game for the Mountaineers.
09:48 So that'll do it for us here tonight.
09:50 For Christopher Hall, I'm Scottie Callan.
09:51 You've been watching the Mountaineers Now postgame show.
09:53 Make sure you hit that subscribe button on YouTube at Mountaineers Now.
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10:00 We'll see you guys Monday on Between the Ears.
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