Mountaineers rally falls short in 87-79 loss to UMass
MORGANTOWN — West Virginia had a new look, although it wasn’t quite the new look it expected, but wound up with the same old problems as UMass down the stretch and wasted a brave comeback to fall 87-79 in the Hall of Fame Classic.
The Mountaineers had expected to have RaeQuan Battle on the court after winning his eligibility for the year in the ongoing battle with the NCAA. but after testifying in Wheeling earlier this week he began feeling ill and weak.
It stayed with him and while he flew with the team to Springfield, the symptoms increased, he missed the shootaround and wasn’t available to play.
That didn’t change the idea that this was a change in personnel and style for WVU as Kerr Kriisa made his long-awaited debut after sitting out nine games on an NCAA suspension for rules he broke in Arizona and Noah Farrakhan, who thought he would be out all year after transferring in, was cleared to play by the NCAA and had an eye-opening debut.
Kriisa scored 20 points in his debut and Noah Farrakhan put on an unexpected show with 15 points and was the only trustworthy shooter down the stretch. Quinn Slazinski also had a 20-point night, but it wasn’t enough to make up for the inability of Jesse Edwards to impact the game.
Facing two maulers down low, Edwards hit the floor more often than the basketball did when he was dribbling it. He was bounced around every time he got the ball, wound up with just two points and an injured wrist, spending nearly all the second half on the bench.
“I told the officials someone is going to get hurt,” a disgruntled coach Josh Eilert said, his record now at 4-6. “I know how people play Jesse Edwards because they know if he’s not in the game we can be crippled, so to speak. They continued to fight and hack and hack. I’m concerned because he hurt his wrist.”
That forced WVU to rely on its outside game; it did throw up — and make — an avalanche of 3s, 14 of 31 for 45%, but that isn’t the game that will prove to be a winning formula for them.
They need Battle in there and need Kriisa more as a distributor than shooter.
“Kerr did a lot of good things,” Eilert said. “He made a lot of shots for us, but 15 3s is probably a little much. We shouldn’t have to rely on him to score the ball. Once we get RaeQuan out there he should be getting those types of numbers with his shots and Kerr is going to have to cut back.”
Farrakhan emerged as a difficult guard for UMass.
“Farrakhan is hard to stay in front of,” Eilert allowed. “Noah can help us handle the ball and put pressure on the floor. He’ll be getting more time out there.”
Battle’s absence turned the glare of the spotlight on the debuting Kriisa and what he would bring to the Mountaineers. The name on the back of his uniform was simply Kerr and there was no headband that he had made famous in Arizona, but he was there handling the ball and that’s what WVU had been waiting for.
But it took a while to get into the flow of things and the Mountaineers fell behind 12-4 before the man his teammates call a magician made that lead disappear.
At halftime they were down 15 points and when UMass scored the first three points of the second half the lead was at a game-high 18.
“I told them at halftime we can’t wait to fight. We have to jump them from the start,” Eilert said. “I worked with Frank Martin. I knew his game plan, knew he would be physical and make it tough on us. I told them they better bow up or it’s going to get ugly.”
WVU allowed UMass to get 19 fast break points in the first half while they had none and they were mauled all night on the boards, outrebounded 47-32.
After being down 18 fought, WVU back to give themselves a chance to win but with 2:46 left in the game, they missed eight consecutive shots to let the Minutemen open a lead they could not narrow as Robert Davis, who had only 8 3s all season, made 6 of 8 for his 18 points and this team that came into the game hitting 63% of its free throws wound up making 25 of 32 for the game.