West Virginia Goes Cold In Second Half, Falls To Virginia Cavaliers 70-54

The West Virginia Mountaineers fell to the 10th ranked Virginia Cavaliers, 70-54, in the Jimmy V Classic in Madison Square Garden to move to 7-1 on the season. It was the first time the two teams had met in 30 years.

It was a tale of two halves with West Virginia forcing Virginia to play their tempo, disrupting the Cavaliers' slow, plodding offense, and allowing them to dominate the first half. The Mountaineers lead the Cavaliers by 12 late in the first half. West Virginia's offense went ice cold in the second half allowing Virginia to play their style of ball and go on a 27-8 run early to open up a 8-point lead with a little over 5 minutes left in the game.

The Mountaineers will face Louisiana Monroe Warhawks on Sunday, December 13th back at the WVU Coliseum at 5:00PM.

Here is the FULL BOX SCORE.

Notes:

• West Virginia's 25-14 lead with 8:21 left in the 1st half gave the Cavaliers their largest deficit and first double-digit deficit of the season.
• The Mountaineers forced Virginia into their most turnovers of the season by the 4:00 mark of the 1st half with 10 turnovers. The Cavaliers finished with 19 turnovers for the game.
• West Virginia shot 12-of-21 from the free throw line for 57%. They entered the game shooting 70% from the charity stripe.
• West Virginia shot 40% for the game, while Virginia shot 63%.
• Jaysean Paige led the Mountaineers with 16 points, 3 rebounds and 2 steals off the bench.
• Jevon Carter was benched with 13:00 left in the game after a costly turnover, and never saw action after that.