West Virginia is still without Jesse Edwards and they will most likely be without him for at least the next three games.
Edwards has not played since Dec. 16, and on Dec. 18, it was announced he would miss four weeks due to a fracture of his right wrist. Edwards underwent surgery on Dec. 20, and this past Wednesday was the three-week mark since the surgery.
“Wednesday, would’ve been the three weeks since his surgery. It’s been the three weeks, so we’re three weeks plus. I think he has another week left in the brace before they take pictures of it and determine where it’s at,” West Virginia interim head coach Josh Eilert said Friday.
Following the point, Eilert said it’s going to be rehab for Edwards, which is an unknown timeline.
“At that point, he’s had zero mobility with the wrist, so it will be a fluid situation as to determining what the rehab is in terms of a timetable from there. Originally, I thought four weeks was four weeks to getting back to playing, but it’s kind of like construction — they tell you two weeks, it ends up being four.
“So, in these situations, we’ve got to do what’s best for Jesse, we’re not going to compromise that and put him in a situation where it can affect him long term. So we’re going to make sure we do right by Jesse Edwards.”
As far as what he’s doing in the meantime, Eilert said Edwards has been very active in practice, even being limited to only his left hand.
“He does a lot of work on the side, especially developing his left hand. I think he’s becoming way more comfortable with his left hand. He does a lot of mobility, a lot of conditioning,” Eilert said.
Eilert credited strength and conditioning coach Shaun Brown as well as head athletic trainer Randy Meador as key pieces in helping Edwards through this process.
Without Edwards, Eilert said they have had to put on hold a lot of the sets and actions they want to run. The Mountaineers are currently without a true big man, putting more pressure on WVU’s guards, and not letting them get deeper into the playbook as an offense.
“I think we’ve tabled a lot of the actions that we had to throw it close. We’ll certainly have a reorientation with some of those actions to get those back into the fold to make us more of a balanced attack on the offensive end. You look at almost anybody you play, regardless of if they have a low post threat they’re trying to dump it in close early to establish that,” Eilert said.
“With Jesse back in the fold, we can certainly start to play inside out and it can certainly relieve a lot of pressure teams are putting on whether it be Kerr or RaeQuan or Noah and some of our guard play.”
