Shanna Rose | WV Sports Chat
CLEVELAND — West Virginia again came up just short away from home.
The Mountaineers let a 16-point second-half lead slip Saturday night at Rocket Arena, falling 89-88 in double overtime to Ohio State in the Cleveland Hoops Showdown.
With WVU clinging to a one-point edge late in the second overtime, Bruce Thornton drove into the lane and scored with 3.6 seconds remaining to lift the Buckeyes. The Mountaineers then turned it over on the ensuing inbound pass near midcourt as time expired.
“At the end of the game, from a coaching standpoint, I’ll take the blame on that one,” first-year WVU coach Ross Hodge said on postgame radio. “Should’ve gotten the ball out of Thornton’s hands. He’s too great of a player. We had a hard time. I’ll take the blame on that.
“Some of the thinking is knowing that if you run at him, you’re going to be leaving somebody else wide open and you open up a can of worms. But he had woken up and willed them to victory. We should’ve done something else. For that, disappointed in myself. We had opportunities to really put it away and didn’t take advantage of it. Disappointing.”
The Mountaineers briefly regained the lead on its previous possession when Honor Huff hit a long jumper from the right corner that was ruled a 2-pointer with 11 seconds left.
The second overtime was played almost entirely within two points. Ohio State’s first lead of the period came when Thornton scored to break an 83-all tie. Brenen Lorient answered with a 3-pointer from the top of the key before Amare Bynum made two free throws to put the Buckeyes ahead 87-86. Huff then knocked down the contested corner jumper that set up Thornton’s decisive basket.
Huff sent the game to a second overtime after missing a driving attempt at the buzzer of the first extra session. Earlier in that overtime, his contested 3-pointer in the final minute turned a two-point deficit into a 77-76 WVU lead. Devin Royal later made one of two free throws to tie it.
The Mountaineers built their advantage early behind Lorient and Jasper Floyd, who combined to score 20 of the team’s 37 first-half points while making all seven of their field-goal attempts. No other WVU player made a basket until Treysen Eaglestaff hit a 3 more than 13 minutes into the game.
The Mountaineers carried a 10-point lead into halftime and pushed it to 51-35 — the largest margin for either team — midway through the second half. Bynum sparked the Buckeyes’ comeback with a dunk that cut the deficit to five.
WVU still led by seven with under seven minutes remaining after Chance Moore’s two-handed dunk and was ahead by five with less than three minutes to play following a Huff 3-pointer.
“Our togetherness was really good,” Hodge said. “We stayed the course even when they made their run in the second half. We had some opportunities to pull away and couldn’t get the stops necessary, and then when we got the stops, couldn’t get the rebounds. Some of that is you get collapsed. We didn’t do a great job with some of our ball screen coverages and they’re shooting at the rim, you’re having to help and they’re kind of shooting it to the other side of the basket and going and getting it.”
Ohio State closed regulation on a 7-0 run, capped by a challenged wing 3 from John Mobley Jr. that gave the Buckeyes a 68-66 lead — their first since early in the game. Huff answered by finding Jackson Fields for a tying layup, and the Mountaineers later had a chance to win it, but Floyd was called for an offensive foul in the final seconds. Thornton’s heave from just inside half court missed at the buzzer.
Huff led all scorers with 24 points and made five 3-pointers. He has hit at least five triples in five straight games. Lorient finished with 18 points on 7-for-7 shooting, while Floyd and Moore added 14 apiece.
WVU made 26 of 34 free throws but committed 15 of the game’s 25 turnovers. The Mountaineers shot 12 of 26 from 3-point range but just 13 of 37 inside the arc.
Thornton led Ohio State with 21 points, scoring 19 after halftime. Mobley Jr. and Bynum added 17 each, Christoph Tilly posted 14 points and 11 rebounds, and Royal recorded 11 points and 10 boards.
WVU fell to 0-4 away from home and 1-4 against power conference opponents this season.
“You have to be able to execute down the stretch and make the simple play,” Hodge said. “When you execute it and at least got what you want, we had a pretty high success rate. We have to learn from it. It’s painful. It’s disappointing. We had a couple great opportunities to get quality wins in the non-league, but the bright side is you play in one of the best leagues in the country and there are going to be a lot of opportunities.”
The Mountaineers return home to host Mississippi Valley State on Dec. 22.
Photo Credit- WVU Athletics
