West Virginia men’s basketball earns No. 9 seed, will play Maryland in NCAA 1st round
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West Virginia was rewarded for playing one of the toughest schedules in men’s college basketball Sunday night as the Mountaineers received a bid to the NCAA Tournament.
The ninth-seeded Mountaineers will play No. 8 Maryland (21-12) at 12:15 p.m. Thursday in Birmingham, Ala. The game will be televised on CBS.
At 19-14, the Mountaineers were an NCAA bubble team in the season’s home stretch. They finished 7-11 in the Big 12 regular season and lost to Kansas in the quarterfinals of the Big 12 Tournament on Thursday.
West Virginia, however, played the fourth-toughest schedule in the nation and had a NET ranking of 24, thanks to four Quad-I wins. Seven Big 12 teams qualified for the NCAA Tournament.
“They are excited to play,” Huggins said Sunday night. “They keep getting better and better.
“I thought we were capable of winning five or six more games if we could have made more free throws.”
The Mountaineers closed Big 12 play strong with victories over Iowa, 72-69, on Feb. 27, and Kansas State, 89-81. They then beat Texas Tech, 78-62, in the Big 12 Tournament.
It was the 935th career victory for WVU coach Bob Huggins, who now is the winningest active men’s basketball coach.
That designation previously belonged to Syracuse’s Jim Boeheim (1,015 wins), who announced his resignation last week.
Huggins has guided West Virginia to 11 NCAA Tournament appearances. The Mountaineers last advanced in 2021 when they defeated Moorehead State before losing to Syracuse in the next round.
West Virginia has been led this season by guard Erik Stevenson (15.5 ppg), former Elizabeth Forward forward Tre Mitchell (11.6 ppg, 5.5 rpg), guard Kedrian Johnson (11.2 ppg) and forward Emmitt Matthews Jr. (10.4 ppg), as well as guard Joe Toussaint (9.5 ppg) off the bench.
“The guys understand it’s one and done. They’re more attentive, they play harder,” Huggins said. “At that time of the year, that’s something they look forward to. We’ve got a lot of guys who have played a lot of ball that have never played in an NCAA Tournament.”
Maryland tied for fifth in the Big Ten and beat Minnesota in the Big Ten Tournament before falling to Indiana in the second round.
The Terrapins are led by guard Jahmir Young (16.1 ppg), guard Hakim Hart (11.5 ppg), forward Donta Scott (11.5 ppg) and forward Julian Reese (11.2 ppg, 7.2 rpg).
West Virginia holds a 24-14 advantage in the series and won their most recent meeting in the NCAA Tournament, a 69-59 triumph in 2015 that helped the Mountaineers reach the Sweet 16.
The winner will likely advance to play No. 1 seed Alabama on Saturday. The Crimson Tide play the winner of Tuesday’s Texas A&M Corpus Christi-Southeast Missouri State in a first four game.