MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — West Virginia’s February free-fall has finally taken the Mountaineers out of the Top 25 as the calendar flips to the final month of the season.
Ranked 20th a week ago, the Mountaineers fell out of the AP Top 25 following losses to Texas and Oklahoma. West Virginia is also out of the USA Today Coaches Top 25, where it ranked 19th last week.
The Mountaineers had been ranked every week since Christmas, topping off at No. 12. As recently as the first poll in February, West Virginia was ranked 13th nationally.
WVU has gone 1-6 in its past seven games, and will try to stem the tide with a trip to Iowa State on Tuesday night.
Despite its recent struggles, West Virginia is still considered a virtual lock for the NCAA tournament. The Mountaineers are 21st in the NCAA’s NET rankings, which the selection committee takes into consideration when seeding the tournament.
“In our non-conference [schedule] we have maybe five teams that will win their league. That does nothing but help,” said WVU coach Bob Huggins. “You have to look at the overall picture because that’s what you’re judged by.
“We’ve fallen from a potential 2-seed to a 7, but 7 is a long, long way from not in the tournament. We need to win some games more for our psyche than anything. You can’t just isolate a certain section.
“As they are fond of saying, it’s your full body of work.”