Xavier’s offense meets WVU’s defense in Big East-Big 12 Battle matchup

MORGANTOWN — Xavier just may be the Rubik’s Cube of college basketball.

It’s now up to WVU to walk into the Cintas Center at 6:30 p.m. today in the annual Big East-Big 12 Battle and figure out the Musketeers.

You can twist and turn Xavier’s early season résumé any number of ways, and chances are, not all sides will point one way or the other.

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XAVIER STATS

Xavier’s three losses have all come against top 15-ranked teams (Indiana, Duke, Gonzaga) with the three losses coming by a combined 13 points.

“We’ve played some pretty tough games,” Xavier head coach Sean Miller said following his team’s 95-63 victory against Southeastern Louisiana on Wednesday. “When you play those games, I think sometimes you get hardened yourself.”

The Musketeers’ wins — outside of a 90-83 victory against Florida in the Phil Knight Legacy tournament — haven’t been all that impressive.

And yet Xavier (5-3) just may be the most difficult match-up the Mountaineers (6-1) have faced this season.

“Not unless they trade for the 7-foot-4 guy,” WVU head coach Bob Huggins said in talking about the Mountaineers’ 80-68 loss against Purdue and its center, Zach Edey. “He’s a load now.”

Xavier doesn’t have Edey, but what it does offer is a versatile 7-footer in Jack Nunge, who averages 15 points a game, but also has 10 3-pointers on the season and is shooting 43.5% from behind the arc.

“I think their bigs are much more versatile,” Huggins continued. “I didn’t see (Purdue’s) big fella out there shooting threes. Their 7-footer will go out there and shoot threes.”

And Nunge won’t be alone. Xavier is fourth in the country in 3-point shooting, making 43.2% of its attempts from long range.

UTEP transfer Souley Boum leads Xavier with 14 threes. He scored 23 against Duke and 22 against Florida in the first two games in the Phil Knight Legacy tournament.

He combines with Nunge and 6-foot-6 point guard Colby Jones — he’s 17th in the nation in assists — to form Xavier’s Big Three.

“Their guards have great size,” Huggins said. “They like to find ways to turn them loose at the rim, because they’re great finishers because of their size. Then they play a 7-footer and another guy who is 6-11. We haven’t seen that. Purdue didn’t have that.

“They’re a really good basketball team. They’re aged. They’re not playing young guys. They’re playing guys who have played in big games over the years.”

The question surrounding the Musketeers is their defense.

While Xavier is one of the highest-scoring teams in the country (84 ppg.), it’s also allowing a tad below 74 points, with Gonzaga, Florida, Duke and Indiana scoring an average of 81.

“We haven’t had the same intensity level in our defense,” Miller said. “That’s what we’re trying to get to. You can’t turn it off. You have to play to the buzzer and you need sustained effort.”

And if WVU is trying to figure out Xavier, the Musketeers could ask the same questions about WVU.

The Mountaineers took down Florida, too, but their loss against Purdue marks their only other quality opponent of the season.

“We’re playing against a team that is incredibly hard-playing,” Miller said of WVU. “They are usually that team that plays with unreal effort for 40 minutes. We have to play with unreal effort and we have to be able to rebound.”

Note

Miller told reporters Friday that senior guard Adam Kunkel (11.5 ppg) is practicing again and will play Saturday. Kunkel suffered a head injury in the loss to Duke and has not played in Xavier’s last two games.

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