Talent Show

In my waxed up hair and my painted shoes
Got an offer that you might refuse
Tonight, tonight, we're gonna take a stab
Come on along, we'll grab a cab

Seriously, these things just write themselves. If you haven't seen Joe, Jonnie, and Da'Sean doing the Night at the Roxbury dance yet, here's your moment of Zen. via Deadspin

Color Me Impressed With Truck Bryant

If you asked me what I thought would happen in today's game, the last thing that would have come to mind was how impressed I was with Truck Bryant. Looking at his stats for the game tells you very little about how important he was. Missouri earned the respect I had for them coming into this game by leading the nation in turnovers forced. In my mind, I could just see him getting his pocket picked over and over. Instead, what I saw was someone that just focused on ball security and running the offense. He had a lot of help from Joe Mazzulla and Da'Sean Butler. But West Virginia did a great job with ball security and patients in the offense once they beat the press.

I've bagged on Truck a little bit since I first saw him play for West Virginia. I've been driven to madness by watching him rush down the middle amongst the trees. I may be wrong with that, though. For instance, I don't know that Huggins hasn't asked him to do that. It's just been hard to watch at times over the past couple years. But today I thought he did exactly what he needed to do to help the team to win, and if you're going to mention the bad you have to see the good as well.  Well done, Truck!

There was a lot more dairy goodness to speak of. Particularly Da'Sean Butler. The dude is just a machine. It's hard enough to bring the ball up the whole game under pressure. It's even harder to get involved with the offense after the ball crosses the time line. Butler got WVU into an offensive flow to start the game and kept them ahead the whole game. The more I think about this game, the more I'm really impressed with everyone. The only thing that was odd was all the offensive rebounds the Tigers got. But we'll take it. Survive and advance.

Let's Dance

It's the most wonderful time of year for any college basketball fan. I love it and I think collge football could learn a lot from the way CBB crowns it's champion. Having said that, I have almost no interest in picking winners, brackets, etc. It's just not my bag, baby.

Having looked at Morgan State and what they did this year, I don't know how useful a statistical breakdown would be. I know there are people out there that do those sorts of things. God bless their little hearts, because I have no desire to get into it. But being in the tournament has to have some sort of special posting angle. And the best that I can come up with is to have a mini bracket of some of my favorite bands. You pick the band and I'll wrap each post around the title to  songs of the band you choose.

Your choices are:

Pink Floyd





Midnight Oil

























The Replacements





Spoon





Ovada-Who? This is my band and I think we have enough song titles that I could do three weeks of posts and have fun with the tournament.



Leave your choice in the comments below and we'll pick a winner.

Hey! Big East Champs!

I wanted to hold off on this until I had something to say about it. I still don't. But in a good way. For this team, this year, despite the record there seemed to be a lot of close games and I was never quite sure they deserved the ranking they were getting. I would be lying if I told you that I haven't been a glass half empty guy through the snopocalypse of 2010. Luckily, I've kept that to myself.

I saw a tweet from another Big East blogger that said, "WVU beat the #11, 8, & 7 teams to win the BE tourney. Two locks and one bubble team. Take that every other conference." You have to see that as a positive. Sure we didn't get to play the higher ranked teams. But shit, those teams came to play all year long and I don't know that anyone else could have beat them given the way the top teams performed in the tourney. Other than the losses to Purdue and Syracuse I felt like we had a chance to win all those games after falling behind. WVU played one of the tougher schedules in the country this year. Certainly one of the toughest we've seen in a long time, and came out relatively unscathed. Having said that, I think we do deserve the ranking. Plus, Country Roads playing after the game was pretty awesome! It got better when I considered how painful it was for Pitt fans. Yeah, I'm thinking about the ones that bought tickets for the whole tournament.




And you knew this was going to happen...



Looking at our bracket, you can't be too disappointed.There's some chances there. I don't want to say anymore strictly out of concern for messing with the Basketball Gods. Anyhow, WOOOOOO!!

Good Enough To Win Is Better Than Losing

I've done enough poo-pooing on Elmo to last a life time. So let's instead remember that on a day when the high seeds were going down left and right, West Virginia found a way to win. Maybe it's the two days off, or maybe it's the Moon's orbit. It doesn't really matter. Yesterday was a day for upsets, and the only rule on days like this is survive and advance.

Hopefully WVU got all the bad shots out of their system, because they won't win shooting like that against Notre Dame. And we can't expect the Irish to shoot as poorly as Cincinnati did last night. That was a third grade sandlot bad performance by the Bearcats. Why anyone plays anything but zone against that team is beyond me.

Anyway, these late games are going to be the death of me. Let's end this by giving it up for Da'Sean Butler and his savvy use of the backboard. Yeah, there are probably better videos out there of this moment. But there's something about this one we really like.



Update: It's not like we never beat UC with at bankshot 3 in the post season before.

Punch Me Elmo Assumes The Position

It's early, too damn early. So this is the kind of photo-shopping you get. I was wrong about the winner of the UL-UC game, but the reason the Bearcats won wasn't because of Elmo. If he was any kind of coach, Sosa would have never made it across half court at the end of the game. UC just wanted it more, and the way they were shooting they had to. Because they couldn't hit anything but a dunk or a layup. Scarlet Pitino should have packed it in tight with a 2-3 zone.

Still, seven out of eight isn't bad predicting. St. Johns showed a lot more than I was expecting. Notre Dame did exactly what I expected, as well as Georgetown.

The good news is that I find it very hard to believe that UC will be able to be successful shooting the ball like that two nights in a row. They shouldn't be able to grab offensive rebounds like that against West Virginia. Also, I have to believe that someone from West Virginia would have the guts to step in front of Stephenson and take a charge. When the momentum switched last night it was because of Stephenson driving the lane and no one from Louisville wanted to move their feet and get in front of him.

The only thing running through my head at the moment is a vision of Elmo going ape-shit on the sidelines and getting a double technical called on him. It's a dream I have that I just can't get out of my mind. So I'm not going to worry about any predictions for the other games today. I'm obviously just concerned with a WVU win.

These folks can tell you about the other games:

UC Bearcats Blog
Pitt Blather
Rakes Of Mallow
Troy Nunes is an Absolute Magician
Orange 44
Hoya Suxa
Cracked Sidewalks
The Nova Blog

Guess Who Represents Big East Refs In This Video

If you said Stevie Wonder, you probably watched the WVU-Villanova game today. Of course we are happy with the win, but that game was so poorly officiated today it seems unfair that either team should have to take the loss.

It was a game that meant a lot to both teams and the eventual seeding in the Big East tournament. Check in with I Bleed Blue and White for their prospective on the game. I'll be interested to see how bad the officiating sucked in person.

About This AD Thing

I can barely remember a time when Ed Pastilong wasn't the AD at WVU. That might be from all the drinking, etc. that has taken place since he took over. Anyway, we've taken some shots at him and the department in general over the past few years. Mostly out of anger that everything didn't come up smelling like roses. Even though I think you would be hard pressed to find a time in WVU's history that the sports teams were more successful.

So we won't take any shots at him today. Rather, I just want to say thanks for all the years of service and what you helped to create here at WVU, Mr. Pastilong. There's no doubt you're leaving the program better off than when you started.

I guess what scares me is the possibility that Mike Parsons might take over. Because he's kind of a dick. Between that and Governor Manchin putting in his two cents where it doesn't belong, I'm a little worried about the future of WVU athletics.

It would be nice to see Jerry West or Oliver Luck in the AD spot. But I really don't know how likely either would be. Jerry obviously isn't going to be around for 20 years, and Oliver might or might not depending on what opportunities would come his way. I have a feeling he's going to want to be out on the west coast to see his son play for Stanford.

Whoever it is that takes over, they need to be a savvy businessman combined with a magnetic personality. Thankfully, that excludes Mr. Parsons. Who exactly fits that mold? I don't know. I guess we'll know when we know.

Let's Honor Jack Fleming

A friend of mine started a Facebook Group to have the press box named after Jack Fleming. So if you are on Facebook, click the link and join.

Mission Accomplished

photo via BGN

Senior night went off as planned for the most part. West Virginia was just a step quicker in the first half and they were able to get a lot of calls to go their way early. That helped them to build and hold on to a big lead in the first half. There was a definite let down in the second half as Georgetown made a game of it. But it was too little too late for the Hoyas.

In sad news, it was senior night. This was the last time we will see Da'Sean Butler and Wellington Smith in the Old Gold and Blue in the Coliseum. I don't want to go into lists of accomplishments, etc. That's something better saved for when the season is over, and there is a lot of basketball still to play for this team. For now, we'll just tip our hats and say thanks, guys!

Photo via BGN

Update: Here's Huggs talking about the game and the guys. He could probably say it better than you or me.

Let's Destroya the Hoya

We're basically going to steal from Hoya Suxa to get you ready for tonight's game against Georgetown.



West Virginia can lock up a top four seeding in the BE tourney with a win tonight. As well as adding in another win over a ranked team as we position ourselves for a high seed in the NCAA tourney.

We'll never match the hatred Hoya Suxa has for Georgetown. But for one night, one glorious night, let's destroya the Hoya's!

It's "Punch Mick Cronin In His Crap Lousy Face Day!"

Trademark pending, but this has to be one of the best days of the year. It really has nothing to do with West Virginia's losing ways against Cincinnati over the last few years. We just don't like the way he looks, or talks, or moves.

In previous years, we may or may not have made a cutout for people to print off and attach to a stick. We would look back, but it's Saturday. We don't do research or number things on Saturday unless money is involved.

I hate to bring this up with the recent actions of the fans throwing things at games. You should understand that I only want to punch Mick, not actually do it. My preferred outcome is to see us curb stomp the Bearcats today and I want to see Mick get a couple T's and take the walk of shame off the court. I will then get the video off youtube and put it on auto play til the end of time.

Well That Sucked

I don't know how you lose to a team that gets three technical fouls called on it. Is Truck Bryant the new Jamie Smalligan? Plays the first couple minutes of the game and doesn't get back in. Maybe Truck wasn't the answer, but we needed some penetration last night to open up the shots for us and we didn't get it.

Everything Bobby Knight said last night was true. Poor shot selection, not enough passes, "that's not the guy you want shooting the ball". Very true.

We still could have won the game, though. Maybe more on this later. Maybe not. Grrrr!

Mick Cronin Motivational Speaker

This was a bad idea to begin with and worse considering how nice the folks have been to Huggins. Apologies.

Spreading the Wealth to Beat Rutgers

Rather than Da'Sean Butler or Alex Ruoff doing all the scoring this time, West Virginia had to rely on some unfamiliar faces to get some points. The game started off with West Virginia scoring like they were playing the Washington Generals. The Mountaineers jumped out to a 21-4 early lead. But when Rutgers switched to an odd three man-two zone defense, WVU went cold.

Some point in the second half folks like Dee Proby, Wellington Smith, and Kevin Jones found a soft spot in the Knights defense and started knocking down jumpers.

Rutgers got close a couple times but never took the lead back. The final ended up being 74-56 after the last two minutes of fouling by Rutgers and free throws by West Virginia. You hear coaches talk all the time about every game being "big." Most of the time, I throw that out the window as coach speak. But today and the rest of the regular season every game is going to be big for this team as they position themselves for a high seed in the Big East tournament. As well as a high seed in the NCAA tournament.

Next up is a trip to Cincinnati and a big night for Huggins. I don't want to take anything away from that, but I'm still going to work on the "punch Mick Cronin in the face" t-shirt.

Photo from BGN

Bully Game Goes Well For West Virginia

If you were tuning into the WVU-ND game to see offensive precision, you probably like the first five minutes of the game. After that, it got personal.

West Virginia came out flat and Notre Dame made nifty cuts to the basket and hit threes like they were layups. Honestly, they were hot the whole first half. But at least the Mountaineers made them work for baskets after the opening five minutes.

It got physical and the refs seemed to be good with the heavy contact. Fouls were called, but a lot more weren't. That's the hardest thing about the Big East. It's always physical, but the manic shifts in the way the games are called can leave you guessing about your plan of attack.

I hate that someone threw anything on to the court. It was just a candy bar, but still not what you want to be known for and an unacceptable act on top of that. Even when their goon slams our goon.

The win puts the Mountaineers in a tie with three other teams for the six spot in the conference. Three road games up for WVU before finishing out the season at home. This game was important because the Mountaineers need some momentum going into the tournament. There's been a lot of ups and downs through this tough stretch of the schedule. Getting a little consistency at the right time can go a long way. We know this.

Worst School Ever Coming To Morgantown

It's not that I really really really hate Notre Dame. It's a little bit that I've been way to nice here lately, when I have been here. It's a little bit hate since I've really enjoyed Notre Dame falling out of the polls with a huge thud. And of course the whole thing about having a D1 football team but not being in the football side of the Big East. I just think of them as freeloaders. If you're going to be independent in football, you should have to be in all sports.

Having said that, everything the Villanova game did for validating the season, a loss to the Irish could take that away. It's going to be just as important for a big rowdy crowd to show up. It's going to be more important for Truck Bryant to stay out of foul trouble, Ruoff to hit some shots, and Ebanks to fly to the rim. Because if Notre Dame is worth a damn as a basketball team at all they are going to have a plan to slow down Butler. We beat Nova because everything went right and everyone was on the same page. The Irish got a shot of confidence when they beat Louisville and South Florida at home. Let's make them feel unwelcome when they come into Morgantown tomorrow.

A Mountaineer Tips His Cap

We did a Q&A with Villanova blog I Bleed Blue and White for the upcoming game between WVU and Villanova, however we feel uninspired to ask any questions because of a death in our family of friends. Thanks to Chris for reaching out to us and understanding our need to put the game on the back burner. Hopefully there will be need for future discussion of our two fine programs.

Fouls

Ugh, we couldn't take advantage of Fields and Blair getting two quick fouls in the first half because of our own. We never adjusted to the way the game was being called, and Pitt did. There were bullshit calls going both ways, so I won't accept that the refs had any hand in the outcome of the game. So West Virginia needs to regroup and finish out the season strong and get in the tournament. Nothing has changed with that goal. It's all still there for the taking.

Alex Ruoff Would Like To Remind You Why You Should Guard Him

I think you can point to a lot of reasons why Alex Ruoff hasn't been as effective this year shooting three pointers. The Joe Mazzulla injury has forced him to take on more roles, being a senior and taking on more of a leadership role, people guarding him tighter, etc.

Even though Butler didn't have his best night shooting, I was happy to see that the offense was running through him early in the game. Because this left Ruoff open to do what he does best, and obviously Butler should be the focus of the offense. It's an offense that is still finding itself, though. With the development of Ebanks, Bryant, and Kevin Jones the offense is diversifying and the onus to score isn't solely on Ruoff and Butler. And hopefully that is going to benefit those two as the season plays out. As we saw yesterday, when you aren't guarding Ruoff he will kill you.