MORGANTOWN — De’Vion Harmon stood at the foul line Saturday for, at that moment, seemed like a harmless free-throw attempt that would mean very little.
Instead, Harmon’s miss set off a cycle of devastating events that would lead to Texas Tech riding off into the sunset with a 78-72 victory against West Virginia inside the Coliseum.
“We’ve got guys just standing there watching the ball,” is how WVU head coach Bob Huggins tried to explain things that seemed to have no explanation. “They never went to rebound. I don’t have an explanation for that. As long as I’ve done this, I don’t have an explanation for why you would stand there and not rebound a miss.”
To set all of this up, what you need to know in the moments that came before Harmon’s trip to the line, was WVU guard Kedrian Johnson had just nailed a nice fade away jumper that gave the Mountaineers a 63-55 lead.
There were just 8:16 seconds left in a game that could have been a major boost toward WVU’s chances at reaching the NCAA tournament.
“We’re up eight,” Huggins said. “All we’ve got to do is take care of the ball, run good offense.”
But, when Harmon missed that second free throw, it was rebounded by teammate Robert Jennings, who was fouled.
He made one, but missed the second, which was then rebounded by teammate Jaylon Tyson.
A groan was heard throughout the 13,940 in attendance, and then things got worse.
“At the free-throw line, we don’t move,” Huggins said. “That turned the game around. You all can say whatever you want, but that turned the game around. There’s no rhyme or reason why any of that happens.”
Seconds later, Johnson had a drive to the rim that was blocked and turned into Tyson — he scored a career-high 27 points for the Red Raiders (15-12, 4-10 Big 12) — scoring on a runaway dunk that wasn’t contested.
“That’s not us wanting to win, man,” said WVU guard Erik Stevenson, who buried six 3-pointers and scored 27 points, but also took 21 shots to do it. “We were up eight at home and we let teams get three offensive rebounds and we let teams get wide open-lay-ups and uncontested dunks.
“It’s hard to beat a team that way, I don’t care who you’re playing. If you give teams one-on-zero attempts at the rim, they’re probably going to score.”
Tyson’s dunk cut WVU’s lead to 63-59 and then Jennings added another bucket — on yet another offensive rebound — and then Pop Isaacs scored another fast-break runout after Tre Mitchell fell down and tried to pass the ball on his way to the floor.
“We didn’t get to some of those 50-50 balls back in Lubbock,” Texas Tech head coach Mark Adams said about the Mountaineers’ earlier road win at Texas Tech. “Part of our goal today was not to be out-rebounded, which we weren’t, and fewer turnovers, which we did. The bottom line for us was that we wanted to attack on both ends and make sure we didn’t get out-hustled.”
Rather, it was WVU (15-12, 4-10) that lost out on the hustle plays when it mattered most.
Along with that, WVU also got beat on the boards, 39-28 (Texas Tech had 15 offensive rebounds and 12 second-chance points), as well as committing 14 costly turnovers, including one where Emmitt Matthews Jr. simply threw the ball out of bounds while trying to inbound it to teammate Joe Toussaint.
Once Texas Tech tied the game with 6:30 remaining, the best WVU could do was tie it one other time and pull within one of the lead, 72-71, after a three from Johnson, who finished with 20 points on 8 of 13 shooting.
But, the Red Raiders never trailed over the final 6:30, and Tyson’s 27 points was backed up by teammate’s Fardaws Aimaq double-double of 14 points and 12 rebounds.
“We didn’t come to play as a team and we deserved to lose,” Stevenson said.
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