BOSTON, Ma. — Can West Virginia upset the team many believe to be the best remaining in the NCAA Tournament?
“In a perfect world, it’ll be allowed to go like old Big East style and bang it,” said MetroNews Statewide Sportsline host and Mountaineers play-by-play man Tony Caridi. “And that only helps West Virginia.”
Brad Howe, Caridi’s co-host and analyst, was a touch more bullish on the Mountaineers chances.
“If you can get these guys frothed up and believing that no one is giving them any recognition or credit,” Howe said Friday on MetroNews “Talkline” with Hoppy Kercheval. “That generally plays well for West Virginia. So, start there. If that part of the story line comes true, West Virginia is going to be in this game.”
Caridi compared Villanova to a familiar foe — and the only top seed remaining in the NCAA tournament.
“Villanova is Kansas,” he said. “That’s what they are. Plus, probably, a little bit… on certain nights they can usually be better because they have one additional shooter on the floor cause they have five guys that can put it around the perimeter.”
Howe also touched on the officiating, saying a crew willing to keep the whistles around their necks gives West Virginia’s hard and aggressive press a better chance.
“Can West Virginia, which prides itself on — not just on defense — but making other teams uncomfortable, can they get this Villanova team to be uncomfortable?”
That’s a tall task, though. Villanova shoots just over 50 percent from the floor, just over 40 percent from the three-point line, and more than 77 percent at the foul line.
“Talk to anybody that’s been a shooter,” Howe said. “And they’ll tell you that they want some space. They don’t want somebody on them. They don’t want somebody banging them. They don’t want somebody leaning on them. That’s what makes West Virginia good.”
Villanova also features two potential future NBA players in Jalen Brunson and Mikal Bridges. Brunson averages 19.1 points per game. and Bridges averages 18 points per game.
Brunson is, in many ways, the feature match-up of the game. The high-scoring guard holds an assist-to-turnover ratio of 2.76 to 1 — and he’ll be squarely in the cross-hairs of two-time Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year Jevon Carter.
“I felt like ever since our freshman year, we’ve always been underrated,” Carter told reporters Thursday. “We’ve always been the underdogs coming into any game we’ve played. Me and Dax, we feel like we never got the credit we deserved. We feel like we’re the best backcourt in the nation. But I guess don’t nobody else besides us see us that way.”
He remained mum on his former high school teammate, though.
The margin-of-error, Caridi said, is paper thin.
“West Virginia is going to have to play extremely well,” he said.
Tip-off is set for 7:27 p.m. The game can be heard courtesy of Westwood One radio on WAJR 104.5-FM and 1440-AM beginning at 7 p.m. The game will be televised on TBS.
The winner will advance to the Elite Eight, facing the winner of No. 2 Purdue and No. 3 Texas Tech.