No. 9 WVU Returns to Home to Host Northeastern on Tuesday

The West Virginia University men’s basketball team will play for the first time in a week on Tuesday when the Mountaineers host Northeastern.

After suffering a loss to No. 3 Kansas last week, WVU (7-2, 1-1- Big 12) has been eager to get back on the court and move past it. West Virginia was originally scheduled to host Buffalo on Tuesday, but the Bulls had to cancel their trip to Morgantown due to COVID-19 protocols so as the team has done several times already this season WVU quickly found a replacement opponent for Tuesday in Northeastern (1-5).

West Virginia coach Bob Huggins said preparing for this new game on the schedule has not been as difficult as some of the others, because the game was rescheduled early enough to give them enough time to properly scout and prepare for the Huskies. In that preparation, Huggins came away impressed with NU’s sophomore point guard Tyson Walker.

“Their point guard’s terrific,” Huggins said Monday morning. “I think everything starts and stops with him. They’ve got a bunch of people who can make shots. They spread you because they can make shots. Everybody they put on the floor is capable of making perimeter shots.”

WATCH: Bob Huggins on Preparing to Play Northeastern on Tuesday

Walker leads the Huskies in scoring, averaging 17 points per game this season with 5.6 assists and 2.2 steals. WVU’s own sophomore point guard, Miles ‘Deuce’ McBride, said keeping the ball out of Walker’s hands will be the Mountaineers’ top priority.

“They really like to keep the ball in his hands a lot,” McBride explained. “With our defense, we’re going to try and deny him the ball and try to make his life as hard as we can. He really runs the show, when he’s playing well they’re playing well.”

WATCH: WVU Players on Getting Over Kansas Loss, Getting Back on Track

Other than Walker, freshman Jahmyl Telfort is averaging 13.8 points per game and is shooting 71.4% from three-point range this season (10 for 14). As a team, NU is shooting 42.3% from the floor and 35.7% from three.

Juniors Jason Strong and Shaquille Walters both average 9.2 points and Walters is the team’s leading rebounder, averaging 7.2.

Huggins said another aspect of this game will be playing well for the entire game. He said the Mountaineers have gone on runs of good play this season, but need to be able to sustain it throughout an entire game.

“We haven’t really played 40 minutes yet,” Huggins said. “We’ve played for a while then we let them catch up then we play for a while again. We really haven’t had the opportunity to play as many guys as what we normally would this time of year.

Huggins also said he wants to play more of WVU’s younger players and needs to be able to work them into the rotation in order to see what they can do.

Despite some of the team leaving Morgantown for the holidays, Huggins reported that everyone on the roster passed their COVID protocols and will be available to play Tuesday.

The Mountaineers and Huskies will tip-off at 2 p.m. Tuesday from the WVU Coliseum. The game will be available via streaming on ESPN+.