West Virginia loses at Baylor 71-62

Behind Jonathan Motley’s monster second half, No. 11 Baylor managed to beat No. 10 West Virginia 71-62.

The Mountaineers (23-7) got off to a rough start as a Jevon Carter three-pointer was the only thing WVU did from the field for the first eight and a half minutes of the game.

West Virginia shook off the doldrums by rallying a 15-3 run to take the lead 18-15 with 8:50 left in the first half.

The game remained back and forth for the remainder of the half and the Mountaineers went into the locker room with a 30-28 lead.

The second half started out just as stagnant as Tarik Phillip and Daxter Miles had answers for everything Motley was throwing at them.

Elijah Macon contributed with a couple of jumpers and Carter added another during a five minute Baylor scoring drought from the field to give West Virginia at 49-41 lead with 9:04 remaining.

At that point, the Mountaineers seemed to run out of gas. Baylor (24-6) finished the game by outscoring WVU 30-13 to clinch the victory.

Carter led the team in scoring with 18 points. Phillip and Macon also finished in double figures with 12 and 11 points respectively.

Motley was the games leading scorer with 23 points. Al Freeman added 12.

Jo Lual Acuil Jr. finished with the game’s only double-double with 11 points, 10 rebounds.

West Virginia will play its final game on Friday, hosting No. 24 Iowa State on Senior Night.

The university will be sending off James Long, Teyvon Myers, Tarik Phillip, Brandon Watkins and Morgantown-native Nathan Adrian.