Huggins Team Struggling

The WVU basketball team plays at the WVU Coliseum in Morgantown, West Virginia. NBA great Jerry West took WVU to a NCAA finals and last year they shocked UK to make an appearance in the Final Four, but this year may not be so good.

West Virginia basketball, after the Jerry West era, was not much to talk about. It was a mediocre program for many years under the leadership of Gale Catlett. They had some success in the 1980's but really started to win after John Beilein took over in 2003. Belein exited and in 2008 Bob Huggins came back to his hometown after coaching in Cincinnati and Kansas. In 2010, Huggin's WVU basketball team made a Final Four appearance.

Other noteable mentions for West Virginia University are it's Rifle team who has 14 NCAA Rifle Championships, Women's Soccer who won the 2011 BIG EAST title, and "The Pride of West Virginia", the official marching band of WVU which was awarded the Sudler Trophy for its excellence in 1997.West Virginia fans are some of the most loyal in the nation. Win or lose, you will see blue and gold fill the seats game after game, regardless of the weather, indoors and out. WVU has also produced 19 Truman Scholars, 30 Goldwater Scholars, and 25 Rhodes Scholars.

West Virginia plays it's basketball games at the WVU Coliseum. The facility is a 14,000 seat multipurpose arena located in Morgantown, West Virginia. The arena opened in 1970 and also is home to WVU women's basketball, men's wrestling, and women's volleyball and gymnastics. With nearly 100 offices, 13 rooms for seminars and lectures, safety lab, courts for raquetball & squash, and a dance studio, the coliseum is home to more than 10.5 million cubic feet of indoor campus space. The roof of the coliseum was designed to direct crowd noise back to the floor which makes the facility less than ideal for musical performances.

After last year's Final Four appearance, West Virginia fans might have high hopes for men's WVU basketball. However, the year could be filled with ups and downs for Bob Huggins' team. After an exhibition loss to Nothern Kentucky, the Mountaineers have opened the season 2-1, with a loss to Kent State and a win over Alcorn State and Oral Roberts. Really? A loss to Kent State? Well, it's not as bad as it sounds because Huggin's WVU team is young and Kent State has four senior starters, so experience obviously factored into the outcome. The Golden Flashes (the what?) took the game by a score of 70-60 in the WVU Coliseum so it was not really a close game. Huggins comments sounded as though he was disappointed in the entire team, though, for missing layups and lack of rebounds. The season opener against Oral Roberts with a victory, 78-71 in Morgantown. At one point, WVU led by 14 points but the Golden Eagles' full court pressure led to 21 turnovers by the Mountaineers. The WVU basketball team let the lead evaporate and dwindle to 74-71 before gaining a turnover and evenutally spreading the gap by the final seven point score difference.

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Daniel Young For a nice selection of quality West Virginia apparel visit our online WVU Store.