Mountaineers need to move on after tough loss to Notre Dame

With 9:48 to play in the first half, West Virginia held a 12-10 lead against Notre Dame.

Thirty seconds later, sophomore guard Jerian Grant's jumper tied the game and for the next 24 minutes, the Irish held the lead.

Notre Dame went into the locker room with a 10-point lead and extended that lead to as many as 12 points early in the second half.

So, when West Virginia was finally able to regain the lead with a little more than five minutes to play in the game, it didn't come without a lot of hard work against an Irish team that prides itself in slowing the game's tempo when it has the lead.

"Once they have a seven-point lead, they're comfortable with it because they're going to play with the ball for 32 seconds," said junior forward Deniz Kilicli. "An 11 or 12-point difference is a lot tougher to come back from against a team like that. That's a lot of points when they hold it like that, and we did it.

"But with that kind of team that has sharpshooters, if you make one mistake, they make you pay for it."

That mistake came with two minutes to play when the game was tied at 45.

Grant stole the ball from WVU senior guard Truck Bryant and hit a three-pointer to give the Irish the lead for good.

In the final 1:52, the Mountaineers were outscored 10-6 for their fourth loss in five games.

It was also the first time West Virginia has lost back-to-back games at the Coliseum since January 2008.

"This one hurts," said senior forward Kevin Jones. "This was a tough loss. This is a game that we were really sure we could win."

With six games remaining and only six Big East Conference victories, the Mountaineers have now found themselves in a situation where they have to win down the stretch or else they will miss the NCAA tournament for the first time since head coach Bob Huggins as been at WVU.

"We're not dead yet," Kilicli said. "We lost the battle, but still we're not dead. Once you don't do stuff the first time it just gets harder, and that's what happens."

When West Virginia struggled at the beginning, many of the problems stemmed from mental lapses that the young Mountaineers were having.

Now, that they're beginning to struggle again, those same mistakes are returning to haunt the Mountaineers. Wednesday, Huggins tried to stress to the team what it should mean to get to play in a West Virginia uniform and play for the people of the state.

"Everyone in this state works so hard to get what they deserve," Kilicli said after the game. "When we don't dive to the ball, it looks bad. I think it's disrespectful to the fans and I apologize for that.

"We should think about that tonight; everybody should. Some fundamental issues you can go over it, and you can change it, but when we have issues in our hearts, that's a bad thing."

This inexperienced WVU team has never been in a position like this.

This is the first time it has really had to play its way into the NCAA tournament in the final games of the season in quite some time. As far as Kilicli sees it, the team can treat this situation one of two ways: The Mountaineers can step up and get in, or they can phone it in for the final six games.

"The reality is that the worst situation we could put ourselves in is in front of us," he said.

"If you want to be a baby, and just go down and cry about it, we'll lose another six games, and we'll go to the NIT. We've got to suck it up and just play the next game.

"Everybody says they love this game more than anything, now's when you show it."