MORGANTOWN — If you’re an athlete at Texas, the expectation is already built in that you’re competing for Big 12 championships, well, in any sport one would imagine.
Even though Kim Mulkey has moved off the Baylor sideline and onto LSU’s, the Bears’ women’s basketball program isn’t that far removed from dominating the Big 12 for more than a decade.
Kansas State’s women’s basketball team has maybe the most dominant player in the conference in senior center Ayoka Lee.
There were reasons for these programs to thrive and to be comfortable with success.
Then there is West Virginia, a women’s hoops program that has gone 10 years since it tied Baylor for the 2014 Big 12 title and — aside for the 2020-21 season — hasn’t been in serious contention since.
That may be about to change following the Mountaineers’ 70-66 victory against No. 23 Oklahoma on Saturday inside the Coliseum.
In of itself, the No. 24 Mountaineers (22-3, 11-3 Big 12) continue to be a great story, one in which they refuse to back down or buckle under the mounting pressure.
They also refuse to accept the notion that when you look at the four-team race that is developing for the 2024 Big 12 title that they are not the program which doesn’t belong, even though the Mountaineers were picked to finish eighth at the start of the season.
“They are staying the course,” is the way WVU head coach Mark Kellogg began his explanation. “We didn’t pick ourselves eighth, other people thought that of our program. I thought it was a little low at the time.”
What WVU accomplished Saturday was knock off the No. 1 team in the Big 12 standings to put themselves right in the mix with Texas and Kansas State.
And they continue to build believers out of the rest of the Big 12.
“This is a very good basketball team,” Oklahoma head coach Jennie Baranczyk said of WVU. “If they can continue to build their crowd and have an environment like they did today, this program is going to be very good.”
It is a program that has constantly built up momentum from Day 1 under Kellogg, the program’s third coach in three years.
At one point, getting WVU into the national rankings felt like the ceiling, but now we’re talking about so much more.
Following this win against the Sooners, WVU continues to build an elite resumé worthy of Big 12 contention, as well as becoming a host site for the NCAA tournament.
“That’s not something we talk about too much,” Kellogg said. “We’ve worked our tails off to be in this position. A lot of people say we’ve overachieved, but it’s not over yet so you can’t talk in those terms yet.”
Just in case, though, WVU officials have submitted a bid to become a host site for the opening rounds. If WVU finishes as one of the top 16 teams in the country, Morgantown will become a host.
“There is still much of the gauntlet to be played,” Kellogg said. “We’re right in the middle of our biggest gauntlet of the season.”
True, much is still to be determined with a trip to No. 7 Kansas State on tap next week, and then following that up with a home game against Baylor.
But then you see WVU is ranked No. 19 in the NCAA’s NET rankings and will move up following the win against Oklahoma.
Could this be? Dare we even say it?
To this point, WVU has given us no reason to believe it doesn’t belong with the best, so why not dream big at this point?
“We got the buy-in,” Kellog said. “The team got the buy-in from each other, they got it from the coaching staff. It came together quickly because of all of those things and we’re obviously in a place that allows you to have success.
“I don’t want it to end. I just enjoy the heck out of it.”
