WVU's 2-3 zone was its key to victory

Because math, which morphs into analytics, doesn’t always tell the true story.

Consider, if you will, the biggest mistake of the night was discovered at halftime when the Mountaineers showed 42 points on the scoreboard, but by the time they came out to play the second half, that had been changed to 40 points as a shot that had been registered as a basket was in reality a miss.

Ergo, 42 points became 40.

But back to that 2-3 zone. Most would credit point guard Kobe Johnson’s breakout performance with career highs in points (19), rebounds (6) and assists (5) with being the key to the game.

In truth, the decision to push the 2-3 zone really was the main factor in the victory and, on a night when WVU played what traditionally has been West Virginia basketball from the Bob Huggins era, they did so while playing a defense that Huggins mostly stayed away from, the 2-3 zone.

Huggins liked a physical game, he liked an intimidating, in-your-face defense such as the “Press Virginia” defense that became a trademark.

But this season at WVU, with only eight eligible scholarship players at present, there is no way that much energy can be drained on defense and expect 40 minutes of play at the top level.

The answer was found in that 2-3 zone, something Jax State never expected.

“I think the biggest difference from tonight compared to the Monmouth game is we saved a lot of legs on the defensive end with a zone,” Coach Josh Eilert explained. “We felt more comfortable tonight with the zone this week than I did against (Monmouth fifth year senior guard) Xander Rice.”

Not that what he did run on that night helped any with him, as Rice dropped 30 points on WVU.

But it helped with the offense that was so bad against Monmouth.

“It seemed to keep our legs fresh, so we were downhill and with pace and playing with pace on the offensive end and everything seemed to be clicking a little better. We shot it way more efficient, 8-for-19, I’ll take that every day of the week,” Eilert said.

While the Mountaineers fell behind early in the game, when they decided to play aggressively in the 2-3 zone, Jax State was flummoxed.

It wasn’t that they turned the ball over a lot, having only 10 for the game, but their shots were challenged and often hurried, finishing with just 34.4% shooting for the evening.

Because of that, it didn’t matter that they had 16 more shots than the Mountaineers. They wound up with two fewer baskets.

The zone traditionally forces teams to shoot from outside and it can cut down on penetration.

More important to WVU, it is a defense that fits the Mountaineers best player, Jesse Edwards, perfectly as he spent his entire time at Syracuse playing in Jim Boeheim’s 2-3 zone that includes a lot of nuances that aren’t yet in at WVU but that Edwards will help install.

“Jesse is a natural back there. He spent four years in a zone,” Eilert said. “So, we picked up a few things that we could just nail down, and we didn’t overcomplicate it by any means. We just wanted to pick two or three things, and most every kid has played a 2-3 zone. So, it’s not like it’s crazy or unnatural, but there are things he’s given us that we can utilize, and we’ve kept it pretty simple.

“So, the main thing is trying to navigate those ball screens when they set those ball screens on those top guards. That’s probably the issue we probably could clean up the best.”

If you think back to WVU’s defense the last couple of years, they were susceptible to both ball screens that led to pick and rolls or to backdoor cuts that produced dunks.

“When you have Jesse Edwards, who played at Syracuse where it was a staple for 100 years, he’s teaching us the zone,” WVU forward Quinn Slazinski said. “It’s ‘Jesse, what should we do here when this guy catches it?’ He’s doing a great job of being a leader.”

Now no one should go off crazily and order NCAA Final Four tickets because Jacksonville State is far from being the Kansas Jayhawks, but it gives the Mountaineers a tool to help it get through the time it is low on personnel.