MORGANTOWN, W. Va. — Referred to by Bob Huggins as West Virginia’s best on-ball defender this season, Chase Harler is looking to close out his college career by adding a little more to his resume.
Maybe that includes team comedian for the guard from Marshall County.
“I get (Huggins) to laugh every once in a while,” Harler said after coming off the bench to score a season-high 14 points in the Mountaineers’ 76-61 victory against Iowa State on Wednesday. “I always tell him that I’m Moundsville’s finest, which usually gets him going.”
Huggins shot right back, “He says a lot of things. He’s a great kid. He’s a wonderful human being and he’s played really well. He’s had a heck of a year.”
How that year finishes for Harler and the 13th-ranked Mountaineers (18-4, 6-3 Big 12) is still to be determined.
West Virginia has the second half of its Big 12 schedule remaining, with two games left to play against top-ranked Baylor and also a home game remaining against third-ranked Kansas.
“I’ve only got nine more regular season games, so I’m trying to go out with a little bit of a bang,” Harler said. “My teammates are getting me the ball in a good position to score and luckily I’ve gotten in the gym a little more and started to make some shots.”
Harler is shooting 43.4% from the field this season, the highest of his career. He’s recorded 14 steals, also the most for his career.
“We wouldn’t be 18-4 without Chase,” Huggins said. “Chase has made big shots for us and Chase is one guy you can depend on to do the right thing and be in the right place.”
Back on the road
With a quick turnaround that leads to Saturday’s road game at Oklahoma (14-8, 4-5), West Virginia players were ready to discuss their recent misfortunes away from the WVU Coliseum.
“Until we go and have a good performance on the road, we’ll be faced with those questions,” WVU forward Emmitt Matthews Jr. said. “It’s up to us to answer them. We’ve got to lock down and go win some on the road.”
WVU’s last two road games were losses at Kansas State and at Texas Tech that came by a combined 24 points.
Both teams are also below West Virginia in the Big 12 standings.
That will be the case Saturday, too, against the Sooners.
“We just have to be locked in,” Harler said. “It seems like on the road, we get off to slow starts. That’s like the No. 1 rule is you can’t get off to slow starts on the road. You kind of get yourself in a hole.”
WVU is 3-4 in true road games this season, but is a perfect 12-0 at home.
Long time coming
Matthews joked after the Iowa State game that he couldn’t even remember the last time he scored in double figures.
It was Dec. 14, against Nicholls State.
That all changed in the first half against the Cyclones, when he went 4 of 7 shooting and scored all 12 of his points in the first 20 minutes of the game.
“It feels good,” he said. “I’m just happy that we won. We go back on the road now and we haven’t won a road game since Oklahoma State, so we’ve got a lot of room to grow and we’re headed in the right direction.”
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