MORGANTOWN — We welcome you to Lubbock, Tex., where No. 14 West Virginia will be the visitors inside United Supermarkets Arena on Tuesday against No. 7 Texas Tech.
The significance of the game is obvious in terms of the Big 12 standings and challenging for the No. 2 seed in the Big 12 tournament, as well as national poll implications.
Maybe more significant is the 9 p.m. start time, because it is the last 9 p.m. road game of the regular season (we think) for the Mountaineers (13-5, 6-3 Big 12).
Those who have had the opportunity to work closely with Huggins know that poor defensive effort is at the top of his list in what will get under the coach’s skin. Maybe No. 2 on that list is 9 p.m. start times for a road game in the Big 12, especially in the middle of the week.
Why? It all revolves around the travel and the hassles that come with returning home, and then what happens once the team does return to Morgantown and what happens the next day. It all becomes a sort of blur, one Huggins said he’s talked about with Big 12 officials for years.
“We’ve talked to them since the beginning,” Huggins began. “What I’d like for them to do is just ride with us a few times. We’re going to get home at 5 a.m., or later, and then our guys have to go to class and go to study hall. I’d like for those guys (in the Big 12) to have to go to class and not fall asleep; go to study hall and not be groggy. I’d like for them to find out, so they say, ‘Man, why do we do this to these people?'”
Now, we say this is the final 9 p.m. road game, but there still is an unscheduled road game at No. 2 Baylor that needs to slide in somewhere and it’s possible that could become another late start, but that is for another day.
As for the 9 p.m. situations, nine times out of 10 the Big 12’s hands are sort of tied. ESPN handles the time slots for each league that it deals with and the Big 12 has traditionally been a later-start league.
Remember the old Big Mondays of the Big East? Well, the Big East would always get the 7 p.m. game and the Big 12 would always get the 9 p.m. game, which wasn’t a big deal, of course, when the Mountaineers were in the Big East.
These days, the 7 p.m. slots (if your game is featured on ESPN) are taken up by either the ACC or the SEC and it’s because those leagues are in Eastern Standard Time. The Big 12 is an hour behind, so it gets the 9 p.m. games. It makes sense, unless you’re West Virginia traveling across the time zones just to play a conference game.
“I understand the TV part of it. I’ve been working with TV for a long time,” Huggins said. “But, whenever you’re going to get back at 5 a.m., I don’t know how in the world all the rhetoric that we get about wanting to do what’s best for student/athletes. We’re just starting a new (semester) here, and this puts our guys behind the eight ball and nobody seems to think about it or care about it. I’ve talked with (WVU athletic director Shane Lyons) about it. Shane has talked to people about it, but it hasn’t changed.”
There is an easy solution, but one that Huggins would not stand for, and that is to simply field a bad team. See, ESPN pays the Big 12 a handsome sum of cash to televise its games and that cash gets broken up and divided among the league schools in the neighborhood of $30-35 million each summer.
The Big 12 wants to promote its brand by having its best teams play in those 9 p.m. Big Monday and Super Tuesday games. It’s highly unlikely that ESPN is going to change those time slots just to accommodate one school, so as long as the Mountaineers are one of the best teams in the Big 12, they’ll have to deal with some very late starts.
If WVU was projected to finish at the bottom of the Big 12, it would be playing more on ESPN+ or ESPNU and those games would have earlier start times. It is an unfortunate price to pay for the Mountaineers for being good, but it would be hard for anyone in the WVU athletic department to admit that it’s worse than the alternative.
So, we say hello and good-bye to one final late road game of the 2020-21 season, unless the road game against Baylor gets rescheduled for a late start. It may be a while before we find that out. The Mountaineers still have two home games against TCU and Oklahoma State that need rescheduled and we have yet to hear anything about those, so any scheduling announcement with the Baylor games could take some time.
For now, we have a top 25 showdown with the Red Raiders. Here’s what you need to know:
TV: ESPN (Comcast 35, HD 850; DirecTV 206, DISH 140) for the 9 p.m. tip-off. BETTING LINE: Texas Tech is a 5.5-point favorite.
HAVEN’T WE MET BEFORE?
On Jan. 25, these two teams may have put forth an effort for a Game of the Year candidate, certainly in the Big 12. WVU’s 88-87 victory saw Deuce McBride’s drive to the basket with six seconds remaining provide the game-winning score, but Texas Tech’s Mac McClung nearly stole it away with a jumper at the buzzer that bounced off the back side of the rim.
Both teams held a double-digit lead. WVU trailed by 12 with 7:11 remaining in the game. Both McBride (24 points) and McClung (30 points) were at the top of their games. WVU shot an amazing 12 of 19 from 3-point range and both schools combined for 21 threes.
WVU went a perfect 10 of 10 from the field down the stretch and had six players score in double figures. Texas Tech got off 21 more shots than West Virginia, a result of 11 offensive rebounds and seven steals.
Both schools are known for their defense, but played little of it on this night.
Can we see the same type of game again tonight?
“That would surprise me,” Huggins said. “Generally, it’s been a rock fight. We’re guarding way better now than we were then, as well. I think they’ve guarded pretty consistently. They switch everything. They’ve got all of those guys about the same size and they’re all physically very strong.”
PROJECTED STARTING LINEUPS
WEST VIRGINIA (13-5, 6-3 Big 12)
F–Derek Culver, 6-10, jr., 14.3 ppg, 10.3 rpg
F–Jalen Bridges, 6-7, fr., 4.2 ppg, 2.0 rpg
F–Emmitt Matthews Jr., 6-7, jr., 7.8 ppg, 3.9 rpg
G–Deuce McBride, 6-2, soph., 15.8 ppg, 4.6 apg
G–Sean McNeil, 6-3, jr., 10.2 ppg, 1.7 rpg
TEXAS TECH (14-5, 6-4 Big 12)
F–Marcus Santos-Silva, 6-7, sr., 8.3 ppg, 6.5 rpg
G–Micah Peavy, 6-7, fr., 5.2 ppg, 2.7 rpg
G–Kevin McCullar, 6-6, soph., 10.7 ppg, 7.1 rpg
G–Mac McClung, 6-2, jr., 17.2 ppg, 2.4 apg
G–Kyler Edwards, 6-4, jr, 9.8 ppg, 5.1 rpg
PREDICTION TIME
Can we simply bet the over? If these two teams approach anything like the first game, that would be the safest bet. The problem here is just how much faith do you put in the Mountaineers’ defense? They were good against Kansas, which is great, but was that a one-game deal or a new identity of the team? Huggins believes WVU is playing better D now, so we’ll see how it looks on the road. The other problem is Texas Tech doesn’t really match up with the Mountaineers on paper. Obviously games aren’t played on paper, but you’d think the Mountaineers would be able to take advantage of some size mismatches with Derek Culver. Jalen Bridges is due for a big game, but will WVU be able to defend McClung any better? I think Texas Tech wins a close one at home, but I don’t see the Red Raiders covering the spread. I’ll go Texas Tech, 81-78.
Justin’s season picks against the spread: 6-9-1.
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