MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — In an unusual scene, the second half of Saturday’s West Virginia-Oklahoma game was delayed several minutes as game officials tried to sort out what happened at the end of the first half.
Due to a timer error, it turned out the basket that Oklahoma appeared to have scored 1.6 seconds before halftime took place after the buzzer should have sounded — which it never did, leaving the Mountaineer mascot to shrug his shoulders in confusion before firing a freelance shot into the air.
Two Oklahoma points were taken off the scoreboard.
Unfortunately, the slumping Mountaineers needed a whole lot more of them to be wiped out in order to beat the Sooners.
Oklahoma (18-11, 8-8 Big 12) shot just a shade under 50 percent from the field to hand West Virginia its sixth loss in seven games, 73-62.
The 20th-ranked Mountaineers (19-10, 7-9) will no doubt fall out of the Top 25 Monday in the wake of their current three-game losing streak. But far greater issues are at hand for a team that can’t buy a basket, especially from long range.
After a 4-for-25 performance from three-point range against the Sooners, West Virginia is 16 percent from behind the arc in its past four games and 28.3 percent for the season. The Mountaineers are 341st out of 353 teams nationally in three-point shooting, and dead last among teams in power conferences.
“We make them in practice,” said guard Chase Harler. “Guys come in and get extra shots up. They’re just not falling during the game, which is kind of weird.”
As WVU coach Bob Huggins noted, the transition from an empty gym to a packed arena is proving to be a much different world.
“When you miss as many shots as we’ve missed — we’ve got guys on our team who are 1 for the last 27 they’ve taken or something like that,” Huggins said. “I look down our bench and see a whole bunch of guys with their heads down. I’d have my head down too.
“Before this game, our enthusiasm wasn’t a problem. But it’s one thing to stand with nobody in the gym and make shots than it is when there’s 14,000 people in there counting on you to make them.”
Oklahoma, on the other hand, was hitting circus shots while West Virginia missed open looks. The spark that set the Sooners ablaze was an improbable shot early in the second half.
With Oscar Tshiebwe in his face and the shot clock expiring, Oklahoma guard De’Vion Harmon fired a three from the corner off of one foot as he leaned out of bounds. It went in, sending the Sooners on what would turn into an 23-8 run and a 17-point lead.
Led by a return to the once-famed West Virginia press and the determination of freshman point guard Miles McBride, the Mountaineers fought back even after at least one-third of the WVU Coliseum crowd of 14,044 decided it had already seen enough.
But one frustrating sequence summed up the game and indeed the entire month of February for West Virginia.
Those fans still remaining worked into a frenzy when Gabe Osabuohien intercepted an Oklahoma pass in the lane, creating a fast-break opportunity and a chance to cut the margin to two scores with 2:22 remaining. But McBride missed a layup attempt, and trailer Jermaine Haley misfired on a putback attempt from inside a foot.
Either one of those shots would have made it a six-point game.
Instead, Oklahoma guard Austin Reaves grabbed the rebound on Haley’s miss and was quickly fouled. He drained both free throws to extend the margin back to 10 and send many of the faithful who had stuck around towards the exits.
McBride ended up as West Virginia’s leading scorer with 13 points. Oscar Tshiebwe had nine points and 10 rebounds, but played sparingly in the second half.
“There’s two ends to the floor,” Huggins noted of Tshiebwe’s decrease in second-half playing time.
Oklahoma’s Kristian Doolittle led all scorers with 19 points, and Brady Manek added 15. Doolittle continues to do a lot against West Virginia, adding to his 27 points when the Sooners beat the Mountaineers in Norman on Feb. 8.
By the numbers
West Virginia continued its season-long struggle at the free-throw line, shooting 52.6 percent (10 of 19)… Oklahoma was 13 of 16 (81.3 percent)… Derek Culver finished with five points on 2 of 11 shooting from the field.
Next up
West Virginia’s road schedule mercifully comes to its conclusion with a trip to Iowa State on Tuesday at 9 p.m. The Mountaineers have lost six straight away from WVU Coliseum.