WVU Women Ready For Anything As They Prep For Backyard Brawl

A pair of blowout wins to begin the season has the WVU women feeling pretty good about themselves after the first week of play. 

With the Backyard Brawl next on the schedule, however, the No. 15 Mountaineers know that what has come before has no bearing on a matchup against their biggest rival.

“They have a bunch of new kids on their roster so I would expect this to be a ‘throw the records out’ type of game,” WVU coach Mark Kellogg said Saturday. “It’s going to be a battle and probably go the whole 40 minutes.”

Even though Kellogg is only in his second season with WVU, he’s already learned how unpredictable games against Pitt can be.

Last year’s Brawl in the Steel City initially looked like it would be a runaway victory for the Mountaineers. WVU led by seven points after the first quarter and by 10 at halftime. Just over three minutes into the third quarter, however, and the Panthers had taken a one-point lead.

“We were up there (last year) and we jumped on them early,” Kellogg recalled. “Then they came all the way back and we had a good fourth quarter to put that one away.”

WVU regained a nine-point lead by the end of the frame and won 71-62.

With so many returners on this year’s team, Kellogg said he won’t need to spend any time explaining how important the Backyard Brawl is to WVU and its fanbase.

“I think everybody gets it,” Kellogg said. “We’ve already had a football game this year. Men’s basketball’s going to play them next week later in the week. I think we know what that is.”

Pitt has also opened the year 2-0, blowing out Canisius 78-36 before squeaking by Bucknell 64-61 on Saturday.

Kellogg implored WVU fans to pack the Coliseum for the game. 

“There were times (Saturday) when it was rocking, there were times Tuesday night when it was rocking,” he said. “I imagine it’ll be pretty good (against Pitt), we need some students to come out and have some fun. I don’t think we have any other conflicts on Tuesday night, so there’s no reason not to come out and support this team.”

The WVU women drew their largest opening crowd in over a decade during last week’s season opener against Towson, and over 1,000 more fans attended Saturday’s win against Niagara.

Tipoff for the Backyard Brawl between WVU and Pitt is scheduled at 7 p.m. tomorrow and the game will be broadcast on ESPN+.

For a related story, the WVU women moved up one spot in the first AP Poll of the season.