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No. 10 West Virginia falls at the Phog, 75-65

West Virginia now sits in a three-way tie atop the Big 12 with Kansas and Oklahoma.
West Virginia now sits in a three-way tie atop the Big 12 with Kansas and Oklahoma.


Entering the rematch between Kansas and West Virginia, Jayhawks’ head coach Bill Self wanted to watch his team correct the problems it had in their loss to the Mountaineers last month.

In the previous meeting, Kansas turned the ball over 22 times and West Virginia capitalized by scoring 18 points off of those turnovers.

Tonight, Kansas fixed its turnover issue, scored effectively in transition and beat West Virginia, 75-65 at Allen Fieldhouse in Lawrence. Kansas turned the ball over only 15 times and West Virginia scored just 13 points off of those giveaways.

With the loss, after holding sole possession of first place in the Big 12 for two days, No. 10 West Virginia (19-5, 8-3) drops into a three-way tie atop the standings along with No. 6 Kansas (20-4, 8-3) and Oklahoma.

Throughout the contest, Kansas never trailed but did have had a hard time pulling away from West Virginia.

Leading 53-40 with less than 13 minutes to play, it appeared as if Kansas could start to runaway from West Virginia, but as the Mountaineers did throughout the night they fought to get back in the game.

It was at this point only when West Virginia was able to use its defense to create offense.

Guard Jaysean Paige knocked down a three-pointer to cut the lead back to ten points. After Kansas turned the ball over twice, forward Nate Adrian made a layup. Then, West Virginia guard Tarik Phillip took the ball away from Kansas guard Frank Mason III, which eventually led to two free throws from Devin Williams.

Kansas’ lead was cut to six points midway through the second half. Following a free throw from Kansas forward Landen Lucas, Adrian countered with a three-pointer to trim the deficit to only four.

West Virginia trailed 54-50, but it was as tight as the Mountaineers would make the game. West Virginia just didn’t have an extra run in them to even the game or to take the lead.

Wayne Selden Jr. of Kansas fired a three-pointer to put his team ahead by seven and then on the other end of the floor, when Phillip took the ball towards the rim for a layup, he was fouled by Mason even though Mason took a spill to the ground. The officials reviewed the play and called a dead-ball technical on Phillip for elbowing Mason in the face.

Phillip missed his free throw and Mason made one of his two attempts.

Kansas led by eight with less than seven minutes to play and from there, never had to look back.

Lucas finished one-point shy of a double-double, scoring nine points and grabbing 16 rebounds. In the game, Kansas outrebounded West Virginia, 33-28. Kansas forward Perry Ellis led all scorers with 21 points.

The Jayhawks also managed to take advantage of mistakes made by West Virginia. Kansas had 14 points off of ten turnovers committed by the Mountaineers.

For West Virginia, both Williams and Paige finished the game with 14 points.

Kansas will return to action on Saturday when they go to the Lloyd Noble Center to meet Oklahoma, while West Virginia will get to play at home in Morgantown against TCU.

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