Morgantown, West Virginia – Following West Virginia’s blowout victory over Kansas State on Saturday, Jordan McCabe didn’t mix words. McCabe thinks the West Virginia Mountaineers are national championship contenders.
“We have a few things to fix and get up to Huggins’ standards. Defensively, we have to shore up a few things that are Huggs’ philosophy and then I think if we get that down we are a national championship team. I don’t think anyone on our team is shying away or backing down from that statement anymore. This is a top five team in the country right now,” McCabe said in his postgame comments.
McCabe, a junior, is averaging 2.5 points, 1.5 assists and 1.3 rebounds per game, has become a leader for the Mountaineers and Bob Huggins’ coach on the court and in practice.
“I’m not the smartest guy but I try to listen to and surround myself with smart people. I happen to be around Huggs and he always says he’s the smartest man in the room so I try to listen to him and so I understand if we sweep the final four games of our season – which is a big-time test going into tournament time – we should comfortably be on that one line (meaning #1 seed in the NCAA Tournament).
If we beat Baylor and TCU and a very good Oklahoma State team, hypothetically you’d assume that we’d be in that conversation for the overall #1 seed. That’s our goal and we aren’t going to shy away from it.”
With a win against Baylor on Tuesday and wins against TCU and Oklahoma State to close out the season, and a deep run in the Big 12 Conference Championship Tournament, McCabe may be absolutely right.
The Mountaineers, through all the adversity they’ve faced this season, could very well end a #1 season in the NCAA Tournament.
