By PAUL GOTHAM
BUFFALO, N.Y. — Glancing through the West Virginia University men’s basketball program notes one will see that Jevon Carter was named Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year. Nathan Adrian joined Carter on the Big 12 All-Defensive squad, Carter’s second straight All-Defensive team honor. Tarik Phillip garnered Big 12 Sixth Man of the Year.
What you won’t find are McDonald’s All-Americans. There aren’t any. That suits Carter and his teammates just fine.
“We keep that chip on our shoulder,” Carter said Saturday after West Virginia defeated Notre Dame, 83-71 in NCAA Tournament second-round action. “A wise man once said, remember where you come from, and we always keep that in the back of our mind. It wasn’t an easy path to get here to West Virginia. We had to grind it out every step of the way, and when we get on the court, that gives us a chance to prove that other schools missed out on us.”
Carter poured in a team-high 24 on 8-of-15 shooting in a game where the Mountaineers went 10 deep on the bench, eight guys playing eight or minutes. Five netted double figures for the second straight game.
“We go 11, 12, deep, 13 sometimes, and other teams only play six, seven, eight people,” Carter noted. “So, we was always told that our 15 is better than their 15, so we get into that bench, that’s a bonus for us.”
With the win, West Virginia advanced to the Sweet 16 for the second time in three years and fourth under Bob Huggins. The 10th-year head coach knows he has a special group of players.
“I don’t think guys spend as much time working at their craft as maybe they used to, and we’re fortunate,” Huggins said last week. “We got some throwback guys. Jevon Carter, he’s a throwback. He’s like one of the old guys that would just rather spend time in the gym than get on Playstation.
“Kids have changed, certainly. More than anything, it’s instant gratification. When you sit and play games all day instead of being on a playground playing, it’s because you want instant gratification.”
Huggins and his rough exterior with the trademark pullover turns off a portion of the population. The third-winningest active sees the perception as an asset.
“I’ve got about 175 assistant coaches out there that never worked for me to thank,” Huggins stated. “They’re all the time telling people you can’t play for him. He’s too hard on you, this and that. I thank those guys all of the time, because then I get guys that kind of want to get coached. So those guys that think they’re killing us are really helping me.”
A year ago, West Virginia exited after a first-round loss to No. 14-seed Stephen F. Austin.
“I didn’t think our practices were very good leading in a year ago. We kind of took Stephen F. Austin for granted, and they were a really good team. That was a terrible mistake. This year, we’ve been much, much better, but I think probably, to a large degree, of having so many of those guys back that went through the experience a year ago.”
This year West Virginia won two games in Buffalo. The last time WVU won twice in the New York’s Queen City was 2010. That Mountaineer squad advanced to the Final Four.
No. 4-seed West Virginia (28-8) will take on top-seeded Gonzaga (34-1) in the West Region semi-final. A 7:39 tipoff is scheduled from the SAP Center in San Jose, California.
****West Virginia’s Elijah Macon was a McDonald’s All American nominee.
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