For the second time in as many games, West Virginia came up just short with a chance to significantly enhance its postseason resume.
Four days following a four-point home loss to BYU in which the Mountaineers were outscored by 10 over the final 6-plus minutes, West Virginia was upended by Baylor 74-71 in an overtime affair at Foster Pavilion.
The result leaves the Mountaineers (15-10, 6-8) with six setbacks over their last eight games, including their closest losses this season in the last two contests.
“Our guys really fought and sometimes there’s games when you maybe you don’t have that, you lose and those are disappointing. I didn’t feel that way at all today,” WVU head coach Darian DeVries said. “Our guys competed, played together and they were unselfish. Just unfortunately didn’t make enough at the end. Those games that go to overtime, it’s one possession one way or the other and that’s how this one played out. We needed one to go down that didn’t.”
WVU trailed Baylor (16-9, 8-6) by six with 8:24 left after a pair of Norchad Omier free throws, but the Mountaineers responded with eight straight points, including three-pointers from Javon Small and Joseph Yesufu, the latter of which left the visitors in front 54-52 with 6:13 left.
Neither team led by more than two over the remainder of regulation, and WVU was in front for the final time at 61-59 on an Amani Hansberry bucket with 3:22 remaining.
Baylor, which enjoyed a significant advantage on free throws by making 27-of-32 attempts, went in front 63-61 on a pair of Langston Love foul shots with 2:03 left.
On the possession before, WVU’s Toby Okani received a pass from Small and appeared to have an uncontested shot at the rim, but slipped going up and never got off a clean look.
“We had an unfortunate one that we had a wet spot, Toby slipped and it wasn’t Toby’s fault. The floor was wet. Those things happen,” DeVries said. “That’s life. But those are the type of things when games are being decided like that, you’d love to have it and that’s just an unfortunate bad luck on that particular one.”
After the Mountaineers tied it at 63 courtesy of two free throws from Javon Small, a Robert Wright jumper put BU back on top with 1:34 to play.
WVU ultimately got even again when Hansberry rebounded a VJ Edgecombe miss and was fouled with 32 seconds left, which he made the most of by converting two free throws.
Wright missed a jumper late in regulation that would’ve given BU a late lead, sending the matchup to an extra session knotted at 65.
The Bears missed all three of their field-goal attempts in overtime, but made 9-of-12 free throws and never trailed as they held WVU to 2-for-9 shooting over the final 5 minutes.
Love made a pair of foul shots 1:59 into overtime and Wright added two more with 1:36 left, before a Hansberry basket cut WVU’s deficit in half with 1:15 to play.
The Mountaineers trailed 71-69 after Small scored with 43 seconds left, and the deficit grew by one when Omier split two free throws 3 seconds later.
With a chance to tie, Jonathan Powell missed an uncontested three with 31 seconds left, though the Mountaineers were back to within two at 73-71 on Small’s two free throws with 14 seconds remaining.
Jalen Celestine then made 1-of-2 free throws to make it a three-point margin, and WVU called timeout with 3.3 seconds left after it regained possession.
The Mountaineers threw an inbound pass to Okani, who was immediately fouled in an effort to prevent WVU from attempting a tying triple.
Okani missed both free throws, and time expired during a scrum for the rebound.
“We did expect a foul. We were hoping to get it out as quickly as possible before they could go to it. If they did get to the foul, maybe knock two free throws down and try to get a steal,” DeVries said. “I had the wrong play called for that situation and told them we probably would’ve gone a different direction especially with what we assumed was going to happen. That’s on me. I have to come up with a different one.”
Outside of 3-2, WVU never led in the opening half, though the Mountaineers ran off five straight points on a Sencire Harris follow-up and Small’s three to pull even at 21 5:10 before halftime.
Baylor then ran off the next nine points as the Mountaineers were scoreless for the next 4-plus minutes. The Bears assumed what was the largest lead of the contest at 30-21 on Omier’s two free throws.
Small’s four points over the final 38 seconds of the half enabled the Mountaineers to trail by five at the break.
WVU ran off 14 of the first 18 points in the second half, getting a four-point play from Powell along with a Harris trey to build a 39-34 lead for its largest advantage.
“We were just a little more aggressive,” DeVries said. “Certainly we were trying to control some of the pace, but we were a little too passive in the first half. We wanted the guys a little more in attack mode and the guys did a better job of getting in the paint more, getting to the rim and just attacking.”
Small led all players with 22 points and six assists. Okani scored 19 and made 8-of-15 shots while grabbing seven rebounds in defeat.
Harris added nine points on 4-for-5 shooting to go with six boards.
Powell had a team-high nine rebounds, but shot 1 for 12, and missed all but one of his nine triples.
WVU finished 8 for 31 on threes.
Love and Omier scored 17 apiece to lead Baylor, while Wright was instrumental in the victory with 16 points on 6-for-7 shooting.
Celestine scored 10 to make it four in double figures for the Bears.
Omier’s 10 rebounds led all players.
WVU scored 10 more paint points (36-26) and had an 11-2 edge in second-chance points.
“Both teams played incredibly hard. The second half, we had a lot better movement and really it just came down to who was going to make that last one,” DeVries said. “They were able to knock down a bunch of free throws that kind of kept it where it was.”