MORGANTOWN —
Even though he has not played for the past three halves and has been buried in Coach Bob Huggins’ doghouse, Juwan Staten remains a part of the West Virginia basketball team and will be on the road when they play at Iowa State on Wednesday night.
Huggins has claimed that Staten, a transfer from the University of Dayton, has not been on the same page with the coach and that led to an incident against Oklahoma that forced Huggins to bench him.
“Everybody has to be on the same page. If everyone isn’t on the same page, you don’t have a very good team,” Huggins said when asked about it during Monday’s Big 12 men’s basketball coaches’ conference call. “We all make mistakes. He is going to travel and we have two days of practice before Iowa State. We’ll see where everything is and where it goes from there.”
That, of course, stops far short of saying he will reclaim his starting point guard job, but it does say that Huggins is giving him the opportunity to get on the right track.
Such problems apparently have come with the package that is Staten, an extremely talented player who averaged 8.5 points and 5.4 assists to lead the Atlantic 10 while starting 34 games as a freshman at Dayton.
A number of readers’ responses to a Monday column suggested that was why there was not much of an outcry over his transfer from Dayton, even though he had a bright future at the school.
Upon announcing he was transferring to Penn State, an ESPN blog wrote the following:
“The talented Dayton transfer didn’t exactly live up to his prep years hype for the Flyers — and he burned a few bridges in Dayton in doing so ...”
That transfer was anything but smooth, as after announcing he was going to attend Penn State the Nittany Lions coach Ed DeChellis quit his job and left for Navy, opening the door for him to change his mind to attend WVU.
Huggins, who was beginning to rebuild his program, welcomed him to the program along with Aaric Murray, a gifted 6-10 transfer from LaSalle. Both sat out last year and then were joined by Oregon/Boston College transfer Matt Humphrey to give WVU three transfers on this year’s squad.
Humphrey’s contribution for this, his senior season, has been negligible, while Murray has come under some criticism from Huggins about not playing all out every play and recently has been coming off the bench, even though he remains the team’s leading scorer, rebounder and shot blocker.
“We have to get him to not take some plays off, but he’s getting better every time out,” Huggins said of Murray.
This naturally leads to a philosophical question about the wisdom of relying on transfers to build around.
Huggins says he has no problem with it.
“I kind of like it,” he said. “We haven’t had a whole bunch (of transfers), but we’ve had a few over the years.”
He pointed toward Jermaine Tate, who transferred from Ohio State to Cincinnati and was a big contributor to Huggins’ Bearcats, as one who made a difference.
But finding the proper transfers is tricky, especially with basketball’s trends today.
“It’s just with us going from 15 scholarships to 13 scholarships ... transfers happen after season and we often have our allotment of scholarships filled,” he said.
Then, too, there is normally a reason a player is transferring and often it is because the player and the coach are not on the same page, be it playing time or method of running the team or whatever, so there is a risk involved.
Having transfers and young players has turned the season into a process for Huggins, and it shows in an 8-7 record.
Email Bob Hertzel at bhertzel@hotmail.com or follow him on Twitter @bhertzel.
WVU Sports
WVU’s Huggins claims Staten isn’t on same page
- WVU Sports
-
-
HERTZEL COLUMN: Jarrod West treasures time with his family
It came along too late to do me any good, but today I want to offer a very warm thank you to Jarrod West, the one-time West Virginia University basketball hero.
-
WVU in eight-team Cancun Challenge field
West Virginia University’s basketball team will be in a field with seven other teams in the 2013 Men’s Cancun Challenge, played at the all-inclusive Aventura Palace resort near Playa del Carmen, Mexico.
-
Kansas pitcher Taylor shuts down Mountaineers
In its first game of pool play against Kansas at the Phillips 66 Big 12 Baseball Championship, the West Virginia University baseball team was defeated, 7-2.
-
HERTZEL COLUMN: Big 12 baseball tournament is about America
All of a sudden the Big 12’s annual baseball tournament is more about America and the American way than it is about baseball.
And that makes it a wonderful thing. -
Musgrave to pitch WVU’s second game
West Virginia University baseball coach Randy Mazey believes that the change in format of the Big 12 Tournament will benefit his Mountaineers because it allows him to hold conference Pitcher of the Year Harrison Musgrave until the key second game of the tournament.
-
HERTZEL COLUMN: Bill Stewart is missed, remembered
It was Monday, the first anniversary of Bill Stewart’s sudden death while playing the 16th hole of a charity golf tournament with West Virginia University’s former athletic director and his former boss, Ed Pastilong.
-
Miles granted release from WVU
Junior forward Keaton Miles, who suffered through a disappointing sophomore season as West Virginia fell below .500, has been granted a release and will seek a transfer, according to published reports.
-
WVU baseball team helps those in tornado’s path
In so many ways it was a day that called for celebration.
Randy Mazey’s West Virginia baseball team, the team that was supposed to finish last in its first Big 12 season, was sitting in third place on what should have been the eve of the conference tournament. -
FURFARI COLUMN: WVU should reinstate men’s track — not golf
West Virginia University has not had a men’s golf team since 1982 in its sports program.
But Oliver Luck, who’s been the school’s athletic director going on three years, reportedly is talking about bringing back that sport “because it’s cheap.” -
HERTZEL COLUMN- Catastrophes make you stop and think
The scenes have been gruesome, devastation everywhere, words flowing from the mouths of reporters that are as difficult to comprehend as are the images on the eyes.
- More WVU Sports Headlines
-
HERTZEL COLUMN: Jarrod West treasures time with his family
