Macke’s Three Punctuates a Great Night at the Coliseum

MORGANTOWN, W. Va. – Through just 12 minutes of game time, freshman walk-on Spencer Macke has become an absolute fan-favorite among the WVU faithful.

Macke is easy to root for, he is a bit undersized and was overlooked coming out of high school. Kind of by luck he got an opportunity to walk-on with West Virginia and the Mountaineers because his mother knew Bob Huggins, and he is making the most of it.

Like most walk-ons, Macke only ever sees the floor at the end of blowouts, when the game’s outcome has more or less already been decided. Prior to Monday, Macke had gotten into four games, none of them were less than  25-point victories for WVU.

In every one of those games, Macke has attempted at least one shot. Whenever he gets in, his teammates on the floor do everything they can to feed him the ball. They want to see him score, the bench wants to see him score, the student section wants to see him score, everybody wants to see the underdog score.

Again on Monday Macke found his way onto the court with WVU leading Texas by nearly 40 points. He had made a pair of technical free throws earlier in the year against Nicholls so he has scored points, but people wanted to see him score a bucket.

Point guard Jordan McCabe got him an open look as the clock was ticking down, but his first shot was blocked, luckily WVU controlled the block and got the ball back to Macke for one more shot. With 23 seconds left on the clock, Spencer Macke made his first career three-pointer for WVU.

Legend. 👑#HailWV pic.twitter.com/jFs0EFK2ek

— WVU Basketball (@WVUhoops) January 21, 2020

After the game Macke tweeted that he was just trying not to airball it, he had been 0-5 on shots coming into the game.

I was trying not to airball 😳 Thanks Mountaineer nation and my teammates for the support ❤️❤️

— Spencer Macke (@Smacke1313) January 21, 2020

The moment was not lost on Macke’s teammates either. Even after carrying him off the court they had more praise for him postgame.

“It was big. I could talk all day about the kid an how much he works,” Emmitt Matthews Jr. said. “He works just as hard as everybody else and it doesn’t go unnoticed. We know what he can do and we know he can shoot that ball and we’ve just been waiting for him to hit one. Tonight was just the night.”

“Smacke works just as hard as us every day so seeing him hit that shot, that’s the greatest thing for us that we could see,” Gabe Osabuohien said. “Everybody scoring, we love when that happens.”

And to top it all off, the rest of the country got to see Macke’s big moment too. The highlight was shown on ESPN during the Scott Van Pelt Show Monday night and Sportscenter Tuesday morning.

👀 @notthefakeSVP The Best Thing I Saw Today! @Smacke1313 🔥#HailWV pic.twitter.com/18lYxIBv54

— WVU Basketball (@WVUhoops) January 21, 2020

This morning’s Sportscenter with a special segment on walk-on Spencer Macke! 💪🏻💪🏻 #HailWV pic.twitter.com/KTzg1omSoh

— WVU Basketball (@WVUhoops) January 21, 2020