West Virginia, the Best/Worst 10-1 Team in America

Morgantown, West Virginia – West Virginia’s legendary head coach Bob Huggins said it best following the Mountaineers’ 65-59 comeback victory over UAB: “We’ve won a bunch that we probably shouldn’t have won, just by grit and gutting it out.”

In West Virginia’s ten victories against Oakland, Pitt, Elon, Clemson, Eastern Kentucky, Bellarmine, Radford, UCONN, Kent State and UAB, the Mountaineers have looked less than impressive.  With that said, they are 10-1 and have very quality wins on paper.

Connecticut is currently 9-4 and the #20 ranked team in the nation. Despite not having their two best players in the lineup at the time, West Virginia handling business at home against a team like UCONN will go a long way in March when the NCAA Selection Committee seeds them.

Yesterday’s ugly, nasty victory over a really good UAB Blazers team epitomized what this West Virginia team is all about. A win is a win, and ultimately ugly wins are just as valuable in March as

In fact, West Virginia winning ugly builds character and gives the team confidence that they’ll find ways to win even when they are having a poor night shooting or when the opposing team is outplaying them.

While the West Virginia football team lacks an identity, the basketball team is clearly a team that isn’t afraid of going anywhere, against anyone and competing in an ugly brawl.

Following West Virginia’s win yesterday, the Mountaineers’ senior leader and truly the face of the team, Gabe Osabuohien, said the following: “We don’t care about the ESPN odds. Anybody in the country can get it.”