MORGANTOWN — The following will likely leave a sour taste in your mouth. For some players on the 12th-ranked WVU women’s basketball team, that’s the idea.

First, there is the sweet part, which is to say the Mountaineers (27-6) will find out Saturday if they will host the opening rounds of the upcoming NCAA tournament. After winning the Big 12 tournament with a 62-53 victory against then-No. 10 TCU, WVU is in a great position to be named a host for the first time since 1992, when the tournament fielded just 48 teams.

“It’s a coaches’ dream, in a way, you have a vision and put it in front of them and then put these guys in a position to have success,” WVU head coach Mark Kellogg said. “To their credit, they took advantage of it and they’ve earned and deserved everything that’s come their way.”

Now for the sour, which apparently has played some type of role for WVU guards Jordan Harrison and Sydney Shaw for the better part of the last two seasons. They, as well as other players on the team, bite and chew on lemon wedges prior to the game and sometimes during a game to help keep themselves at peak awareness.

In essence, the practice of biting into a lemon is a way for the players to hit the reset button.

“Our sports (psychology) lady Sophia (España Pérez) gives us lemons to shock our system,” Harrison explained. “Before a game, you’re thinking a lot, and so it kind of restarts us, basically. It keeps us grounded to make sure we’re ready to go into the game.”

Dr. España Pérez is WVU’s clinical and sport behavior health therapist, who also works with the men’s basketball team, as well as with the men’s soccer and football teams.

The idea behind the lemons, as Kellogg explained, is comparable to the effects of smelling salts. When it comes to the art of getting WVU athletes to hit the reset button, lemons aren’t the only thing used.

“There are little Dixie cups and they’re filled with sour Skittles,” Kellogg began. “Last year, I walked into a huddle and we’ve got these little cups filled with Skittles, and I’m like, ‘What in the world is going?’

“Sophia was like, ‘Coach, just let that one roll.’ I wasn’t going to question it. That turned into lemons. Whatever it takes to get them in the right spot and to be as efficient and as good as they can, I’m all for it.”

Shaw said on numerous occasions, it’s nothing for her to reach for one of those Dixie cups and take a shot of sour Skittles during a team huddle in the middle of the game.

The practice has become so common for WVU players, it’s really not even that big of a deal to them anymore.

“We’ve been doing it for a couple of years now,” Harrison said. “I don’t know why all of a sudden it’s become a thing.”

For Shaw, her fascination with a sour taste goes back to her childhood.

“As a kid, I used to eat lemons, because I was a little out there,” she said. “Me and my brother would eat them, skin and everything.”

It wasn’t until the Big 12 tournament, though, when TV cameras caught Harrison and Shaw biting into lemon wedges, that the rest of the world caught onto España Pérez’s teachings.

“I see the benefits,” said Harrison, who was named the Most Outstanding Player of this year’s Big 12 tournament. “It’s obviously very sour, and I just forget about my nerves for the game. We’ve been doing it for a while now. I think it’s just now really caught on. I like it. It’s been working. We got a championship, so I’m going to keep doing it.”