MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — West Virginia was bogged down offensively and found itself in a closer-than-expected contest against Mercyhurst more than 6 minutes into the second half of Sunday’s matchup inside the WVU Coliseum.
After Eduardo Andre opened the second-half scoring with a short jumper to leave the Mountaineers with a 37-22 lead, the offense became stagnant, and West Virginia missed its next four field-goal attempts in addition to turning it over four times over a stretch of nearly 5 minutes.
The Lakers, competing this season at the Division I level this season for the first time, got as close as eight and ultimately trailed 39-30 while in possession three separate times.
But with an opportunity to draw closer, Mercyhurst (6-9) came up empty on each of those trips, and on the third, Jeff Planutis was blocked by Andre, starting a sequence that saw Toby Okani rebound the miss and Javon Small ultimately convert a fast break layup.
The Lakers were stuck on 30 points for more than 7 minutes, and by the time they scored again, the deficit was insurmountable with WVU leading 54-30 ahead of Aidan Reichert’s layup with 7:44 remaining.
“Every night, we talk about needing to play to a certain way and defensively, we did,” WVU head coach Darian DeVries said. “We guarded fine and played tough enough on the defensive end. We just didn’t get a lot going offensively. You’re going to have nights like that. So it was good to see our defense carry us a little bit.”
Mercyhurst was 0-for-7 shooting with six turnovers during the all-important stretch that saw the home team rattle off 16 unanswered points, including consecutive dunks from Okani and Small that both came off Laker turnovers in a span of 20 seconds.
“We had to turn it up on defense and try to speed them up a little bit,” Andre said.
The Mountaineers shot a respectable 48 percent (25 for 52), but still had difficulty generating rhythm offensively. WVU made half of its 28 shots in the opening half, but failed to score a fast break point against a methodical Mercyhurst team that often took extended time off the shot clock.
“It was a tough opponent to pull away from, because on offense they’re very deliberate,” DeVries said. “They’re going to run side to side, run one action and then run a second action, so the flow of the game gets really choppy, especially when you’re not scoring.”
In the second half, the Mountaineers shot 11 for 24, but managed 13 fast break points, including six during the all-important 16-0 spurt.
“After that, we got more movement,” DeVries said. “In the first half, it was stuck and everybody was standing around. We weren’t getting enough where they had to chase us around.”
Minus Tucker DeVries for a third straight game and without Amani Hansberry for all but the opening minute of Sunday’s matchup after he exited with a right ankle injury, West Virginia pulled away in large part due to its defense.
The Lakers finished with only 15 field goals on 53 attempts for 28 percent shooting, made 5-of-17 three-pointers and had 16 turnovers with eight assists.
Over WVU’s last eight contests, the Mountaineers have not allowed the opposition to score more than 71 points in regulation, and on six occasions, they’ve held the opponent to no more than 66 points through 40 minutes.
In wins over Iona, North Carolina Central and Mercyhurst, West Virginia has allowed a total of 134 points and no more than 47 in any of the three games.
While injuries to key players mount, the Mountaineers managed to win nine of 11 non-conference games and have already matched their win total from last season.
“We still have a talented group,” Okani said. “Those are two big blows [being without DeVries and Hansberry], but whatever our coaches feel like we need to lean on a little bit more is what we’re going to do.”