West Virginia guard JJ Kunary (right) dives to the floor for a steal during Tuesday’s game against Pittsburgh in Morgantown. (Photo by Kevin Kinder, BlueGoldNews.com)
MORGANTOWN — West Virginia struggled to overcome itself more than it beat Pitt in the final update on women’s basketball’s Backyard Brawl, until its offense turned it around in the fourth quarter of an 82-54 win. He turned up the heat on defense. The season started 3-0.
The Mountaineers took advantage of Pitt losing one of the team’s best players in the first minute of the game and then having their other best player, Javilla Fay, foul out in the third quarter, but ultimately The 15th place team was under pressure from their defense. What makes a difference always holds true.
The Mountaineers overcame a disastrous night, especially on 3-pointers, by forcing 30 turnovers.
He made only 2-of-21 threes in the first three quarters of the game, most of which were missed, but he made a few threes in the 26-point fourth quarter to close out the game. All of them needed to maintain their identity. .
“It wasn’t going very well. Especially in the second quarter, there were too many fouls and the game slowed down.” Coach Mark Kellogg said:
This derailed the game for the Mountaineers, who ended up having to attack the rim, scoring 42 points in the paint.
Usually when they score a lot of points in the paint it comes on fast breaks off steals, but they forced those 30 turnovers, many of them dead-ball turnovers and only a few. They only scored 34 points.
“We wanted to get to the rim. No matter what defense they were playing, we wanted to attack the paint.” Kellogg said as he faced the zone most of the evening. “It was good to score 42 points in the paint and make 27 free throws, because obviously our shooting from three is terrible.”
Mountaineer star JJ Kunary was really frustrated after getting off to a slow start this year. She led the Mountaineers with 17 points, but was 7-of-23 shooting and 0-of-10 from 3-of-10. In the first three games, she is 15-of-48 shooting for 31.3%.
“I don’t think you see it very often.” Kellogg said. “Maybe she took a little too much.”
Kellogg said the next first three games against Texas A&M were important.
“Just to get our identity back. We played another Power 4 team tonight and we haven’t done that yet this year.” Kellogg said. “We just stayed with it and stayed calm. I thought it got a little shaky late, but that’s something we can learn from and talk about.”
The night couldn’t have started worse for Pitt. I watched Kylie Blacksten make a 3 on the Mountaineers’ first shot while the Mountaineers’ Amiyah Jenkins went down with a non-contact injury.
When she screamed in pain, I knew right away that this was more than just a sprained ankle or knee. She sat on the floor for quite some time, asked for help to get off the floor, and was taken to the locker room with what appeared to be a serious knee injury.
Sometimes such injuries can negatively impact performance, and both teams limped through a disastrous first quarter filled with missed shots and turnovers.
Fortunately, WVU held a narrow 12-9 lead when the buzzer sounded, with the Mountaineers shooting just 33 percent and Pitt shooting an even more dismal 27 percent.
Both teams combined for just 2-of-15 3-point shots.
Quinerly continued his early season struggles. She scored 14 points and 11 points in the team’s first two wins, ringing nearly every ball she threw to the hoop.
But Quinerly always had an inkling that something was coming, and some would argue that she got the team out of a funk with the first basket of the second quarter.
Determined to move forward, she dribbled her way through Pitt’s team and took a snake-like drive to the basket for a layup. This was a wake up call to my teammates.
While turning Pitt over, they wasted most of their turnovers, but were still able to build a 10-point lead at 28-18.
At that point, Quinerly got going with two free throws, a basket and a free throw as WVU extended its halftime advantage to 35-25.
But Quinerly was still looking for shots, missing all seven of his first half 3-point attempts.
Whatever Kellogg told the Mountaineers at halftime, you can be sure it wasn’t a mistake. “Great job” –They took that to heart, allowing quick goals and then allowing Quinerly and Jordan Harrison to score six straight points in 42 seconds to push the advantage to 41-27.
The best thing about the third quarter, other than how it ended, was how it ended. Sidney Woodley, a transfer from Long Beach on defense, stole Pitt’s final inbounds pass with 3.6 seconds left, drove to the hoop and scored, and was fouled.
After the free throws, WVU built its largest lead of the game at 56-41, and managed to do so despite hitting only 2-of-21 3-pointers, most of them wide. Achieved. Quinerly’s frustration increased to 0-for-10 on 3-point shots.
Eleven players scored for the Mountaineers, with Jordan Harrison scoring 14 points and Sydney Shaw scoring 11 points. Kellogg is using the preseason to consider his rotation, but he admits he doesn’t have a complete idea of what that rotation will look like yet.
WVU has now won seven straight games against Pitt.
