WVU, Texas Tech Meet In Big 12 Tournament Wednesday Night At 7
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MORGANTOWN -- The way West Virginia's Erik Stevenson sees it, the pressure is off now and, if the Mountaineers aren't now qualified for the NCAA Tournament, they should just … well, let's let him say it because the way he put in on Saturday night after WVU muscled its way past No. 11 Kansas State to win its final regular season game of the year has to be the quote of the year.
"Yeah, we're in," he said. "If we aren't in, I don't know what we got to do … play Joe Lunardi 1-on-1."
He probably better hope it doesn't come to that because the word is out that Lunardi has a wicked Euro-step and can hit the 3 from anywhere and also post up. And, seeing as he does his Bracketology for ESPN, you can bet they'd sign that one and put on ESPN+.
Only kidding, of course, but with 18 wins and top 25 rankings in the NET and KenPom and whatever metric you want other than the Big 12 standings, WVU seems assured of getting into the NCAA Championships and, considering the way they've been playing as they've won seven of their final 12 games after opening the conference schedule with five straight defeats, they are primed to make a move.
They enter the Big 12 Championships playing the best they have this season and say they don't believe they are now under pressure.
"The pressure is off," Stevenson said. "The pressure was today and we played like it for about five minutes."
They wound up with the No. 8 seed, which is the best of all television worlds, and open up with a third meeting with Texas Tech having split two games, each winning on the other's home court. That game tips off at 7 p.m. on Wednesday.
"The seed doesn't matter. We are going to try to win as many games as we can," Stevenson said.
Texas Tech will be without head coach Mark Adams, who was suspended after Saturday's tough loss at home to Oklahoma State for what the school called "an inappropriate, unacceptable, and racially insensitive comment" to a player.
The school said that while encouraging a player to be more receptive to coaching, he "referenced Bible verses about workers, teachers, parents and slaves serving their masters".
Adams apologized to the team and received a written reprimand from the school but later the decision was made to suspend him so they could investigate the situation and his interaction with players and staff more.
Should the Mountaineers win the Texas Tech game they would play at 3 p.m. on Thursday against No. 1 seed Kansas with a chance to avenge one of their most lopsided losses of the year in the first meeting and one of their most thrilling and tight losses in the second meeting at Allen Fieldhouse in Lawrence.
The win over Kansas State served to bolster the confidence for WVU heading into postseason play, getting 27 points from Stevenson, 23 from Kedrian Johnson and 20 from Emmitt Matthews and having four players in double figures.
"It's exciting for me to see," Matthews said. "We have probably one of the most explosive offenses in the country if everything is clicking and I think right now everything is starting to click at the right time."