By Bob Hertzel
MORGANTOWN — When Bob Huggins sits down and writes his book on the secrets of winning basketball, rest assured there will be no chapter on West Virginia’s 75-63 victory over Seton Hall at the Coliseum on Saturday.
See, the secret of playing winning basketball is to step on an opponent’s throat early, then keep it there until they expire.
Huggins’ Mountaineers just don’t seem to understand the concept.
Oh, they’re capable of part a. stepping on the throat. They do it over and over, but instead of applying more pressure and displaying the kind of killer instinct necessary to survive in a conference like the Big East, they seem to dial 911 and let their opponent up off the ground and back into the game.
It’s a script that they seldom stray from and didn’t in this game, somehow surviving again even though they did not score a field goal over the last nine minutes and five seconds of the game, allowing a lead that had grown to 19 points with 16:18 left to play to shrink to three points.
“The problem is that we get it going, then we have guys who start doing those things that are out of the context of what we’re good at doing. It just continues to rear its ugly head,” Huggins said. “We just have to get guys to do things they can do and stay away from the things they can’t do. We’ve proven all the things that we can’t do. There’s nothing more to prove there.”
The players realize it, yet it happens over and over and over again, games that seem secure become nailbiters, if not slip away entirely.
“We just are playing according to the script,” said forward Wellington Smith. “We just let people get back in the game. We get lax, don’t move our feet.”
“It’s been a concern all year,” forward Devin Ebanks said. “We just relaxed.”
This should have really been an easy game for the nation’s No. 8 team. Seton Hall has made matters tough for WVU because Jeremy Hazell has lit them up over and over. In three games before this he had scored 29, 31 and 41 points against the Mountaineers, an average of 33.7 points a game.
But in his last game he mysteriously suffered a deep gash on his shooting hand that took eight stitches to close. While he was able to play, he obviously wasn’t the same player who dropped 41 on WVU in the Big East opener this year, finishing with nine points, all in the second half. He made only two baskets.
“Obviously, Hazell was not 100 percent,” Seton Hall Coach Bobby Gonzalez said after the game. “He came back a little smoother in the second half.”
Hazell did not make himself available for comment after the game.
“You take away 22 points from Hazell and we’re a lot different. Others guys have to step and take Jeremy’s shots,” forward Herb Pope said.
Seton Hall was also playing a second consecutive game without its senior point guard and leader, Eugene Harvey, against one of the conference’s longest and more physical defenses, the result being 12 assists and 16 turnovers.
The game was even being played WVU’s style, which is hard-banging.
“I’m really proud of our guys because they came back and showed incredible heart, toughness and courage to get back in the game and turn a street fight into a war,” Gonzalez said.
West Virginia ran up a 14-point lead by the half and seemed to be on cruise control, but Hall went into a 1-3-1 full court trap that disrupted the Mountaineers’ rhythm and the lead began to shrink until it reached three points, Seton Hall now believing it could win.
“We got to where we had a chance but we just couldn’t get over the hump,” forward Jeff Robinson, Seton Hall’s leading scorer with 16 points, said.
Instead, the Mountaineers marched to the free throw line over and over, hitting 27 of 38 free throws while the Hall had to settle for 12 of 15.
“The positive is there isn’t another team in the country that can shoot 37 percent against those guys and win by 12. We’re winning because we rebound the ball and guys make plays when they have to make plays,” Huggins said.
It proved to be too much for Gonzalez to handle, being nailed with a late technical by veteran official Jim Burr.
“I had a little bit of frustration,” Gonzalez said. “The game was on national TV and I promised my wife I wouldn’t get one, but I didn’t say anything you can’t say at a Catholic school.”
WVU gets little rest, heading to Connecticut to face the Huskies on Big Monday. Game time is 7 p.m.
E-mail Bob Hertzel at bhertzel@hotmail.com.
