NCAA Tournament: Gonzaga Faces Tough Test in West Virginia
By Ben Renner
As NCAA Tournament play resumes this evening, the Gonzaga-West Virginia Sweet Sixteen matchup will feature two incredibly efficient teams.
The NCAA Tournament matchup between one-seed Gonzaga and four-seed West Virginia (tonight at 4:39 on TBS) will feature two of the best defensive teams in the nation. According to Ken Pomeroy’s efficiency rankings, Gonzaga is the best defensive team in college basketball. The West Virginia Mountaineers are fifth.
West Virginia is known for its press defense, which hounds opponents from one end of the floor to the other. The Mountaineers, headed by sweatsuit-clad coach Bub Huggins, stifled a normally disciplined Notre Dame team in the second round, and will try to rattle the offensive machine that is Gonzaga their Sweet Sixteen game.
West Virginia and its swarming defense is effective because it creates turnovers. As Huggins says, according to ESPN: “We try to make people play kind of the way we want them to play.”
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The Gonzaga Bulldogs escaped the second round against Northwestern despite 13 turnovers. The Wildcats scored 17 points off of turnovers in their furious second-half comeback that fell just short in the 79-73 Bulldog win. Gonzaga was also aided by a notorious non-call on basket interference at a critical point.
Something’s gotta give. Gonzaga led the nation in both offensive and defensive efficiency this year, according to Pomeroy’s statistics. Guard Nigel Williams-Goss will have to keep his team from turning over the rock and even exploiting the over-aggressiveness of the Mountaineers.
Huggins uses his deep bench liberally. Only one West Virginia player averages more than 30 minutes a game: Jevon Carter. If Gonzaga is going to find its way through the swirling chaos of the West Virginia defense and advance in the NCAA Tournament, Williams-Goss will have to find a way to get the ball to center Przemek Karnowski when he’s matched up against the smaller forwards of West Virginia.
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The Mountaineers are the biggest test for the Bulldogs this year, with a trip to the Elite Eight on the line. Tip-off is at 4:39 p.m. on TBS.