WVU advances to Sweet 16
AUBURN HILLS, Mich. – After Sunday’s second-round 67-54 victory over Northwestern State, West Virginia will be advancing to the NCAA Sweet Sixteen Round in consecutive years for the first time since the Jerry West days of 1958-1960. “I can’t say I ever thought about going to back-to-back Sweet Sixteen games three years ago,” West Virginia head coach John Beilein said. “I never think that far ahead, but now that we’ve done it, it’s very gratifying.”
In the last two years, the Mountaineers have doubled their Sweet Sixteen appearances as this is only their fourth trip in school history.
“For us to go back to back to the Sweet Sixteen shows how well we play together as a team,” Mike Gansey said. “We hope we’re remembered as one of the better teams in school history.”
The sixth-seeded Mountaineers (22-10) jumped out to a 41-19 halftime lead over the fourteenth-seeded Demons (26-8) on shooting fifty-four percent from the field.
“The 1-3-1 [defense] was a staple in the seventies and eighties but you don’t really see it too much today, so it’s real hard to prepare against a 1-3-1 in one day,” Beilein said.
“We saw on film that we weren’t aggressive enough lately and tried to be more aggressive tonight.”
When Darris Nichols hit a 50-foot three-pointer at the buzzer of the first half, it accentuated a dominant and well-balanced Mountaineer shooting performance in the first half where eight different players scored.
“I’m so proud of these guys to play such a brilliant first half against such a physical, quick defense,” West Virginia head coach John Beilein said. “Northwestern didn’t give in though. We knew the second half was going to be a root canal, and we got ice bags all over the place, but at the end we were still standing and we get to move on.”
Northwestern State made a curious comeback attempt in the second half and closed to 57-49 with 4 minutes left. It was the first time the Demons were within single digits since eight minutes into the game, but they ran out of gas and their deficit proved to be insurmountable.
“We feel like we went from the top of the world to the bottom of the trash barrel,” Northwestern State head coach Mike McConathy said. “I told the kids in the locker room [after the first half] that we came too far and worked too hard not to give a better effort in the second half and we did that, but the lead was just too much for us to overcome.”
Clifton Lee led the Demons with 11 points. When he hit jumper in lane with 4:14 left in the game, he cut the Mountaineer lead to 57-49. West Virginia put the game away by outscoring the Demons 10-5 down the stretch.
Kevin Pittsnogle led the Mountaineers with 14 points although he thought he could have done more. He was only 3 for 14 from the field, but 7 for 8 from the free throw line.
“I missed some shots I usually make, so I credit my teammates for picking up the slack,” Pittsnogle said. “They [Northwestern State] might not have been as big or physical as a Big East team, but they were a different type of tough.”