West Virginia’s second game in 16 days marks its first in Big 12 play under first-year head coach Darian DeVries.
A 2 p.m. matchup Tuesday at No. 7 Kansas that will air on ESPN+ is the Mountaineers’ 12th game in program history at Allen Fieldhouse, a college basketball cathedral which West Virginia has never won inside, falling twice in overtime among the previous 11 setbacks.
“It’s a hard place to play. I don’t think West Virginia is the only one that has a hard time going into Allen Fieldhouse and winning,” DeVries said. “They’re very good there. They have a great home court advantage. They’re well-coached with good players. That has more to do with it than anything. It comes down to playing well. The reason you like to play at home is because you do have an advantage. They certainly do have one of the better home court advantages in the country.”
Kansas (9-2) is 7-0 at home this season and 321-18 at Allen Fieldhouse since Bill Self took over as head coach in advance of the 2003-04 campaign. Self’s KU teams have won 161 of 173 Big 12 games at Allen Fieldhouse.
As a program, the Jayhawks have won 33 consecutive conference openers, 14 of which have come at home.
“Nothing changes. It’s a tough road environment,” DeVries said. “We’re going to see those all year long in conference play. This is certainly one of the better ones and you need to make sure you’re really good at all the little things to give yourself a chance to win on the road. This is one of the toughest places to try and go do that.”
The Mountaineers (9-2) completed a successful non-conference portion of the season when they last played December 22 in a 67-46 victory against Mercyhurst. WVU was without forward Tucker DeVries for the third straight game, while starting center Amani Hansberry exited with a right ankle injury less than a minute in and never returned. Guard Jayden Stone continues to be sidelined as a result of a preseason injury that’s kept him out entirely to this point in the season.
“Pretty much all of those guys are the same as they were when we left,” coach DeVries said. “We have today’s practice and tomorrow’s shoot around to kind of determine where everybody’s at.”
While West Virginia is 3-0 without DeVries, who last played December 6 against Georgetown, the trio of victories are against three of the lesser teams on this season’s schedule.
Tuesday will present an entirely different challenge for WVU than what it has seen without DeVries in the event the senior forward misses a fourth straight contest after he averaged 14.9 points and made 26 three-pointers over his first eight games as a Mountaineer.
“That’s a hard thing to prepare for, because watching what they ran in the last three games compared to what they ran against Gonzaga, Arizona and Louisville are probably two different things,” Self said. “They played so much to get him shots. He’s not a good shooter — he’s an elite guy at shooting the basketball with range that’s really deep. He’s proven he can do it against the best competition. Probably a little bit different. We’ll prepare like he is [playing], but not know as of this point.”
While Kansas’ plan will be altered based on DeVries’ health, it is certain to put a heavy emphasis on limiting WVU point guard Javon Small.
Small leads the Big 12 in scoring with an average of 19.7 points. He’s scored at least 12 points in every game and 19 or more in six of the last eight, totaling 23 or more five times during that stretch.
Small has experience playing KU from his time at Oklahoma State last season, though he struggled over two matchups, shooting 4 for 20 with 10 points, nine assists and seven turnovers.
“What stands out to me more than anything is that we didn’t get him. We recruited Javon,” Self said. “He’s terrific. He has size. He’s 6-4, strong and can get it off the bounce or catch. He’s a point that obviously can score off the ball. He’s a good basketball player and he’s off to a great start. He’ll be a handful for us. We went back and watched the games last year at Oklahoma State to see how we tried to limit him. I don’t think we did a great job on him. He missed some shots that he’s probably making those same shots this year.”
Kansas won each of its first seven games, a stretch that included wins over North Carolina, Michigan State and Duke. Following consecutive losses at Creighton and Missouri, the Jayhawks have defeated North Carolina State and most recently Brown on December 22.
Experienced center Hunter Dickinson leads KU with averages of 15.5 points and 10.3 rebounds. The 7-foot-2 graduate student has blocked a team-best 17 shots.
Zeke Mayo, a 6-4 freshman guard, averages 13.5 points and has 24 triples on 62 attempts, while veteran point guard averages 10.3 points and easily leads the squad with 62 assists against 16 turnovers.
KJ Adams, a burly 6-7 forward, shows a 9.5 scoring average, and is followed by four players averaging at least six points.
“There are a lot of ways they can hurt you, because they have such great balance and very efficient three-point shooting,” coach DeVries said. “They live in the paint with post ups and different actions to drive it. They put you in a tough spot regardless, and as the game is flowing, you have to be able to adjust to it and have multiple things ready to try and slow them down. It’s certainly a big challenge to try and do that.”
With one of the most productive front court players in the country and five players with 10 or more treys, DeVries believes knows slowing down the Jayhawks in entirely is out of the question. Thus, his focus is on what the Mountaineers can do to make matters as challenging as possible for Self’s team.
“You can’t take away everything, and a lot of times if you try to, you take away nothing,” DeVries said. “You have to be willing to live with something — whatever that is. As the game goes on, if you need to make an adjustment to that, then you do that. For us, it’s finding what we think can hurt us the most and trying to take that away the best way possible. That’s what we try to focus on.”