Thursday, March 23, 2006
ATLANTA (AP) -- West Virginia's 1-3-1 zone defense and fondness for having its 6-foot-11 center shoot 3-pointers make the Mountaineers a difficult NCAA tournament draw -- even for a coach who already survived the challenge in the regular season.
Texas beat the Mountaineers 76-75 on Nov. 21 in the Guardians Classic in Kansas City. Now the second-seeded Longhorns are gearing up for a rematch against No. 6 seed West Virginia tonight in the Atlanta Regional semifinals.
Pulling out the tapes of the earlier matchup didn't seem to embolden Texas coach Rick Barnes, who was asked Wednesday whether devising a game plan for West Virginia could be compared to a football coach preparing for a wishbone attack.
Barnes said the comparison with the old-school wishbone offense doesn't fit West Virginia.
"I don't know if I would call it a wishbone more than I would call it that Fun-n-Gun because they spread you out," Barnes said. "They're going to shoot 25 3s. They make more 3s than any team in the country. It's almost like playing against a no-huddle offense."
Second in 3-point shooting
West Virginia ranks second in the nation with 10.1 3-pointers per game, and its 322 3-pointers broke last year's school record of 319.
Senior center Kevin Pittsnogle is second in the school record books, shooting 40.9 percent on 3-point attempts for his career. He leads West Virginia with 19.3 points a game and has made 86 3-pointers.
Pittsnogle said he has spent more time under the basket in recent games.
"I think as of late we haven't relied on the 3 as much as we normally do," Pittsnogle said. "We kind of relied more on penetration and kicking it out and getting 15-foot jump shots."
Mike Gansey, a 6-4 forward, is second on the team with 72 3-pointers and 16.8 points per game. Patrick Beilein, the coach's son, has made 63 3-pointers.
There's nothing gimmicky about West Virginia's success, which is built on more than the 3-point shot.
Stresses strong defense
Coach John Beilein also stresses strong defense. The Mountaineers led the Big East with its plus-7.44 turnover ratio, and they allow 63.1 points a game.
Texas struggled against West Virginia's zone defense and committed a season-high 24 turnovers in its narrow victory in November. West Virginia led 40-35 at halftime and 75-72 with 1:30 remaining before missing three straight one-and-one free throws. Pittsnogle had two of the misses.
"If we turn it over 24 times now, we won't have a chance," Barnes said.
Beilein has West Virginia in the round of 16 for the second straight year after last season's team was a tournament surprise by finishing one win shy of the Final Four.
"Had I known we were going to do what we did last year, I would have kept a journal to try to duplicate what we did," Beilein said.
Beilein said last year's NCAA tournament run was a bigger surprise but said returning to the round of 16 is a bigger accomplishment "because of the expectations" created by last year's success.