MORGANTOWN — As far as season debuts go, West Virginia needed a jaunt through the history books Monday night to find a fair comparison.
The Mountaineers ran past Robert Morris 87-59 in front of a crowd of 9,229 inside the WVU Coliseum in what stands as victory No. 1 at WVU for head coach Darian DeVries.
“The first win is always kind of special,” DeVries said. “I told the guys I hope it’s not the last one.”
It came with a three-touchdown run to begin the game for WVU (1-0), that saw the Mountaineers make 10 of their first 12 shots for a 21-0 lead.
Things were going so good at the start for WVU, you half expected the giant Coliseum scoreboard to show Taylor Swift drinking a Country Roads Lager from a private suite. It may have been the only thing missing on this night.
“The first 10 minutes were great,” said WVU forward Amani Hansberry, who finished with nine points and a game-high 12 rebounds. “I don’t think they scored, but we still have a lot of things to clean up over the next few days. For the most part, I thought we did a good job.”
To put the Mountaineers’ start into context takes a glance at history.
For example, Wilt Chamberlin’s first game in the NBA saw him score 43 points and grab 28 rebounds.
Or maybe it was former New York Mets pitcher Steven Matz who holds the all-time sports debut. All he did in his first MLB game was pitch 7 2/3 innings, gave up two runs and also drove in four in a 7-2 win.
None of those guys, we suspect, were in the same boat as these Mountaineers, a gathering of 13 scholarship players from all parts of the world who had never played a regular-season game together.
That changed against the Colonials (0-1), as did, possibly, any preseason expectations that had been set for this team.
“I told our guys when they’re hooked up the way they were at the start of the game, I’ll take them anywhere,” DeVries said. “Now, it’s just sustaining that, and that’s the piece that will ultimately determine — night in and night out — how good we can be. The goal is to win the game, and they certainly came out and did that tonight.”
When it was all said and done, the Mountaineers were efficient with their shots, going 33 of 60 (55%), connecting on 14 3-pointers — nine in the first half — and came up with eight blocked shots on defense.
Sencire Harris “is a tremendous defender,” WVU point guard Javon Small said. “Him having three blocks didn’t surprise me at all. I think guys are just a little more bought in into what we want to do. We just play hard on both ends of the floor.”
Tucker DeVries led the way with 18 points and he was the catalyst for the fast start, nailing his first three attempts of the game for a quick 8-0 lead.
Small added 15 points and five assists, including one on an inbounds play that saw him lob the ball at the rim, where Toby Okani caught it and finished the moment with a thunderous dunk.
Okani added 13 points and freshman Jonathan Powell came off the bench to hit three 3-pointers to finish with 11 points.
Robert Morris was held to just 32.4% (22 of 68), but did come up with a 41-37 edge on the glass, with 16 of those being offensive rebounds.
“I thought our start was about as good as we could have scripted it,” Darian DeVries said. “I thought we came out and we were super aggressive defensively. Offensively, we were really sharp and were able to get some really clean looks. It was the other 30 minutes that we have to clean up a little bit.”
Notes
** DeVries became the 21st WVU men’s hoops head coach to win his first game at the school. WVU coaches are now 21-2 in their debuts, with Sonny Moran and George Pyle the only ones who lost their first game.
** WVU is now 100-16 all-time in season openers.
** WVU’s 14 3-pointers were the most in a game since hitting 14 last December in a loss against UMass, who the Mountaineers host on Friday.
