MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Hours after returning to the national rankings, the Mountaineers suffered through one of their worst offensive performances of the season in a 65-57 loss to Arizona State at the Coliseum. The Sun Devils left Morgantown with just their second Big 12 victory. West Virginia (13-5, 4-3) was unable to build upon the performance from Saturday’s upset victory over No. 2 Iowa State.
The Mountaineers connected on just 31 percent of their shots from the floor and 4-of-29 attempts from three-point range in a dismal shooting performance that led to WVU’s third-lowest point total of the season.
“For me and my team, we had good shots. They just didn’t fall,” said WVU freshman guard Jonathan Powell. “We kept on shooting. That’s what we go by, just keep believing in one another. But shots just didn’t fall.”
“I think we got great, open shots tonight. They just didn’t fall,” said WVU sophomore guard Sencire Harris. “I think we made it up a little bit on defense but then we started slacking a little bit.”
The shooting numbers only tell part of the story in WVU’s second loss in three games and third defeat in the last five. Senior guard Javon Small has, at times, carried the Mountaineers in point production this season. However, the Sun Devils limited Small to 14 points on 2-of-11 shooting from the floor. He still led WVU in scoring, thanks in part to making 10-of-11 attempts from the free throw stripe.
“We put so much on Javon that on a night that they made it hard for him to get loose and free, we’ve got to be able to find different ways to score,” said WVU head coach Darian DeVries. “That has been our struggle.”
“We just tried to make things as difficult as possible,” said Arizona State head coach Bobby Hurley. “We were trying to show bodies in the driving lanes, guys were stabbing at the ball just so he couldn’t get any clean drives to the basket. He does a great job of drawing contact. He is a physical driver. We just didn’t want to let him get any runouts or transition points.”
After a first half with lengthy scoring runs from both teams, Arizona State took a one-point lead into the locker room at 24-23. ASU jumped out to a 10-2 advantage before a 15-1 run gave the Mountaineers a 17-11 lead. Arizona State countered with eight unanswered points to go up 19-17.
Back-to-back dunks from Toby Okani gave WVU a 23-19 edge before the Sun Devils scored the final five points in the half.
Halftime did little to cool the Sun Devils off. They opened the second half on a 13-1 run to build a 37-24 cushion, their largest lead of the game.
Three days after holding Iowa State to just 57 points, WVU allowed Arizona State to make 16-of-26 shots from the floor in the second half.
“On a night where you go 4-for-29 from three, our defense has got to be what carries us. In the second half when they shoot 61 percent, that’s not good enough. That’s what I know we can do on a nightly basis. We didn’t get that accomplished tonight,” DeVries said.
“You’re going to have a bad shooting night. Our defense needs to carry us every night. If we held them to 34 percent again in the second half like we did in the first half, even though it was an ugly half, it is 24-23. If we do that again in the second half, maybe we have a better result. Our defense let us down tonight.”
Eduardo Andre went 4-for-5 from the floor but he was the only Mountaineer to shoot above 50 percent in the contest.
“I thought we had some really good looks that didn’t go,” DeVries said. “But there were certainly plenty where I felt like we could get something better. To our guys defense, when you are not getting a lot of movement, that’s what you end up falling into a lot, maybe late-clock and fairly-challenged shots.”
ASU outrebounded the Mountaineers 46-28, representing WVU’s most lopsided rebounding deficit in any game this season.
“We liked the matchup we had,” said Arizona State senior forward Basheer Jihad. “We were the bigger and more physical team. We went out there and imposed our will.”
“You can’t give up 14 offensive rebounds,” DeVries said. “A lot of those were just getting into that fight a little bit tonight.”
“I wouldn’t say it was the size,” Powell said. “We played other teams in our conference and just in general with big centers. We just didn’t do the best job of boxing out. It will be something we most definitely clean up in practice Thursday.”
“We just didn’t bring it today,” Harris said. “We’re going to go back in the lab and correct things.”
In addition to Small’s 14-point game, Powell was WVU’s only other double-digit scorer. He finished with a dozen points.
Jihad led ASU (11-7, 2-5 Big 12) with 17 points. Jayden Quaintance (15), BJ Freeman (14) and Adam Miller (10) also reached double-digits for the visitors.
West Virginia will visit Kansas State (7-10, 1-5 Big 12) Saturday.