MORGANTOWN — A hard fall in the pregame shoot-around kept West Virginia point guard Kedrian Johnson from playing in Iowa State’s 84-81 victory against the Mountaineers on Wednesday at Hilton Coliseum.
WVU head coach Bob Huggins said before the game that Johnson has been playing with two sore hips for most of the season and he was officially ruled out during the game.
Johnson had one of his better games Saturday against TCU, finishing with 12 points, five rebounds and four assists.
He was replaced in the starting lineup by freshman Kobe Johnson, who played 19 minutes and scored two points and added a rebound and an assist.
Malik Curry ended up handling the ball more, playing 21 minutes, while scoring 19 points.
“I thought Malik was really good,” Huggins said. “I thought the two guys who substituted for him were really good. (Johnson) tried to play, but there was just no way he could play.”
Battle of the boards
For the third time over the last six games, West Virginia came away with the rebounding edge.
WVU was coming off a game Monday in which TCU held a commanding 42-24 lead on the glass, but the Mountaineers out-rebounded Iowa State 34-23.
In building a 41-31 halftime lead, WVU recorded nine offensive rebounds, while the Cyclones had just nine rebounds total.
WVU held a 19-9 edge on the glass at the break, which led to 12 second-chance points and 16 points in the paint.
Curry led WVU with six rebounds.
News and notes
** Former WVU standout Mike Gansey was promoted to general manager of the Cleveland Cavaliers on Wednesday.
Gansey, who helped the Mountaineers reach the Elite Eight in 2005 and the Sweet 16 in 2006, has been with the Cavaliers organization since 2011.
After spending years as a scout, Gansey became general manager of Cleveland’s G-League affiliate in Canton and was named the G-League Executive of the Year in 2017, before getting promoted to Cleveland’s assistant general manager later that year.
Gansey is a native of Olmsted Falls, a suburb of Cleveland and was elected to the WVU Hall of Fame in 2018.
** With the win, Iowa State ended a six-game losing streak against WVU. Before Wednesday, the Cyclones’ last win against the Mountaineers was on Jan. 30, 2019.
** After being held scoreless against TCU, Sean McNeil bounced back with 11 points on 3 of 7 shooting. He was a perfect 5 of 5 from the foul line.
** A total of 47 fouls were called, which led to WVU going 24 of 27 from the foul line.
** This was the first time in Big 12 play this season that WVU broke the 80-point barrier.
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