MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Esa Ahmad’s game Tuesday at Iowa State began with a timid, off-target pass that missed Devin Williams in the low post and trickled out of bounds.
By night’s end, however, teammates and West Virginia coach Bob Huggins were suggesting they’d seen a breakout game from the freshman forward.
Ahmad shot 4-of-5 from the floor and made all three of his second-half attempts by finding soft spots along the baseline. The first of those baskets, a powerful tomahawk dunk off a dish from Williams, energized the Mountaineers on a 16-5 run that led to a come-from-behind 81-76 win at Hilton Coliseum.
“It’s sort of what we’ve been waiting for,” Huggins said after Ahmad played 28 minutes, nearly doubling his average playing time since Big 12 action began Jan. 2.
Ahmad scored another layup after Teyvon Myers penetrated to attract Iowa State’s rear-zone defenders. Jevon Carter later assisted along the opposite-side baseline as Ahmad cut toward the basket, penalizing Iowa State’s Deonte Burton for a momentary lapse of awareness.
“Esa played a hell of a game because he was attacking the basket with aggression, like we knew he could,” said Jaysean Paige. “He’d been doing it in the summer. He got away from it, but we’ve got confidence in him.”
Rarely has a nine-point output sparked such compliments. Then again, for the past month Ahmad had been having trouble finding any offensive role, or any kind of minutes.
In Ames his timing on baseline cuts was crisp and exploited Iowa State’s lackluster defense.
West Virginia shot 53 percent and scored 48 second-half points on just 36 possessions, representing some of its most efficient halfcourt offense of the season.
“(Our offense) obviously is better when Paige is in there, but we got contributions from a lot of guys,” Huggins said. “That was the talk of the locker room—that Esa came out of his shell.”
Paige joked that Ahmad “didn’t show me nothing” the team hasn’t seen frequently in practice. Agile and skilled at 6-foot-8, Ahmad simply hasn’t been asserting himself at gametime.
“He’s a good player, was a top-50 kid in high school,” Paige said. “He just needs to play with more confidence.”
