NCAA MEN'S ROUND OF 16 Mountaineers keep their hopes alive

West Virginia and Villanova are the only Big East teams still alive.
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (AP) -- Less than two weeks ago, West Virginia was desperate for a win in the Big East tournament just to have a shot at joining the NCAA field.
Now the Mountaineers are left to help carry the banner of a conference that has won the last two NCAA championships.
While Big East heavyweights Syracuse, Boston College, Connecticut and Pittsburgh have seen their seasons end, West Virginia and Villanova are still alive. A double-overtime win over Wake Forest on Saturday night added to the string of Mountaineers upsets that started with a three-game run to the conference tournament championship game.
The school whose biggest basketball claim to fame is Jerry West has made the most of a rare NCAA tournament appearance, advancing to the third round this year to match its previous run in 1998.
"We don't expect anything, and because of that, you're never surprised," West Virginia coach John Beilein said Monday. "It's just been a great run. This is not about having better players or better coaching or anything like that. The ball just bounces your way and you just keep going with it."
Play Texas Tech Thursday
The Mountaineers (23-10) will take on Texas Tech (22-10) Thursday in the Albuquerque Regional semifinals. A win would give West Virginia its deepest march into the tournament since a West-led team finished runner-up to California in 1959.
Not bad for a team that was picked to finish ninth in its conference, had lost five straight in January and finished with a .500 record in the league.
In the league tournament, West Virginia beat Providence, regular season champion Boston College and Villanova before losing to Syracuse in the championship game.
West Virginia rejoiced at earning a No. 7 seed in the Cleveland bracket, then got a last-second win over No. 10 Creighton Thursday and needed double overtime and a career night from Mike Gansey to outlast second-seeded Wake Forest.
"I'm not surprised by anything in March Madness. After the experiences of Madison Square Garden, you can see the Big East's difference is not unlike many of the other major conferences, where all of a sudden a team will get hot like Villanova and us have," Beilein said. "I think that's the beauty of college basketball, to expect the unexpected."
The best game of Gansey's career came not far from where he grew up in Olmsted Falls. He scored 19 of his career-high 29 points in the two overtimes.
"People I haven't talked to since high school are calling me," Gansey said.
Now, instead of playing 3 1/2 hours from Morgantown, the Mountaineers will play 5,314 feet above sea level in New Mexico.
Senior Tyrone Sally is the only player left from the 2001-02 West Virginia squad that won a holiday tournament over Southern Miss and New Mexico at The Pit.
"It seemed like I ran up the court twice and I was out of air," Sally said. "We'll go out there, get a hard practice in and try to get used to it. I think everybody should adjust fine by game time."
First met Bobby Knight
That's when Beilein will meet Texas Tech coach Bob Knight. They crossed paths briefly in the first round of the 1998 NCAA tournament. Beilein's Richmond team had upset South Carolina in Washington, D.C., and Knight's Indiana team was about to play Oklahoma.
"He had the 7 o'clock game. He was walking in at 5:30. I was walking out at 5:30. And he said 'Nice game, coach.' " Beilein said, "and I was thrilled that he knew that I was the coach at Richmond."
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