No. 15 TCU held on for a 76-72 win over West Virginia on Tuesday night without leading scorer Mike Miles, who was injured in Saturday’s loss to Mississippi State.
The win gives TCU a split of the regular season series with the Mountaineers after losing to them earlier this month in Morgantown.
TCU took a 10-9 lead with 14:40 left in the first half and never faltered against a West Virginia team that refused to quit.
TCU stretched its lead to nine points in the first half, but a 7-2 West Virginia run helped trim the deficit to four at halftime.
The Horned Frogs led by as many as 12 in the second half. Still, West Virginia would not go away.
The Mountaineers made it a competitive game late by getting to the foul line and outscoring TCU 16-9 over the final four minutes despite going nearly three minutes without a made field goal attempt.
JaKobe Coles led the Horned Frogs with 17 points, and guard Shahada Wells, who started in Miles’ place, and forward Xavier Cork added 15 each.
West Virginia got 17 points out of leading scorer Erik Stevenson and another 15 from forward Tre Mitchell.
WHAT TO KNOW
TCU lost to West Virginia 74-65 on January 19 in a game in which it trailed by as many as 18 points.
Center Eddie Lampkin Jr. was expected to miss this game while recovering from a high ankle sprain. Instead, Lampkin came off the bench with 14:38 left in the first half. He played eight minutes, scored two points, and had a rebound with two assists.
TCU improves to 17-5 on the season with a 6-3 record in Big 12 play. The Horned Frogs are tied with Iowa State for second place in the Big 12 and trail the University of Texas-Austin by one game.
West Virginia has played the seventh-hardest schedule in the country this year and has six games remaining against ranked opponents.
BY THE NUMBERS
TCU was outrebounded 31-18 and fouled West Virginia 24 times in their first meeting this season, which is something Jamie Dixon has emphasized improving. TCU led in rebounding for most of this game, but the teams ended up with 32 rebounds each when the final buzzer sounded.
TCU was called for 18 fouls, while West Virginia committed 17.
West Virginia leads the all-time series 18-5 but is now 6-5 in Fort Worth and 2-5 against Jamie Dixon’s teams on the road.
Jimmy Bell Jr. and Kedrian Johnson combined for 35 points and 16 rebounds in the first meeting and were held to just six points on Tuesday.
WHO SAID
Cork on the approach against West Virginia’s style of play:
“One thing we always focus on, especially with a team like West Virginia who is very physical, is we gotta get tougher. That first game, they really out-toughed us, so we knew that was one of the impacts of this game, but I feel like we really used that today.”
West Virginia head coach Bob Huggins on how his team could have played a better game:
“I was extremely upset with us in the first 10 minutes of the game, just our lack of energy and our lack of competitiveness. I tried to talk to them about it at halftime, and it was better, but you put yourself in a hole and then every little thing probably becomes way more important than what it really is.”
NEXT UPÂ
TCU (17-5, 6-3) visits Oklahoma State (12-9, 3-5) at 1 p.m. CT on Saturday. West Virginia (13-9, 2-7) hosts Oklahoma (12-9, 2-6) at 7 p.m. CT on Saturday.
