It's not fair to tag Joe Alexander with goat horns because he missed that free throw on the "and 1" with 15 seconds left. Yes, it would have given WVU a 1 point lead, but there is no guarantee that the refs would have still swallowed their whistles on the contact when Lavender pulled up for his shot. Alexander also had 14 points in the second half and had 10 rebounds in the game. Without Alexander, there is no comeback and chance for WVU to win.The killer for WVU was something that might be vaguely familiar to Mountaineer fans. Giving up a wide open look to a solid 3-point shooter in a corner at a key moment, because the defense collapsed too much. In this instance, the Mountaineers were defending the inbounds play and two players chased Josh Duncan, leaving B.J. Raymond all alone in the corner on the other side. The inbound pass went to him on one bounce and he drilled it to put Xavier up by 4 with 29 seconds left. Xavier came away with the win in OT, 79-75
WVU lost to Pitt back in February. In the final seconds of regulation, WVU up by 2 and Pitt's Ronald Ramon took the inbounds pass. He couldn't find an open shot and passed to Keith Benjamin who began a drive to the basket. Ramon ran to the corner and his man left him to help on the drive. The ball was tossed out to Ramon who drained the open 3 at the buzzer.
It should be worth mentioning at this point that Xavier Coach Sean Miller was a star point guard in the 80s at... Pitt.
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Reader Comments ( Page 1 of 1)
1. The guy inbounding the ball traveled -- blatantly -- well before making the cross-court pass.
Posted at 7:09AM on Mar 28th 2008 by RobinFiveWords