Eilert talks about WVU’s struggles and moving forward after huge loss to Texas

After a 94-58 loss to Texas on Saturday, West Virginia men’s basketball interim head coach Josh Eilert talked about what went wrong for the Mountaineers and moving onto TCU on Monday.

“I know there’s a lot of things we can point out defensively that we didn’t do [correctly],” Eilert said.

“Their game plan right off the bat was putting Jesse (Edwards) in a ball screen and picking and popping to (Dylan) Disu. And credit to him. I mean, for the first, I think he was four for four from three to start the game, and he knocked down shots.”

Texas’ Dylan Disu ended with 27 points after starting the game a perfect eight for eight from the field, including six of six from three.

“But I really felt like it was deja vu here, looking at this box score, thinking about last year in this arena. So credit to them, they played a great game,” Eilert said.

Last season, on Feb. 11, 2023, the Longhorns defeated the Mountaineers in similar fashion 94-60. Eilert took accountability for the team’s misperformance on Saturday.

“I told those guys in the locker room, I didn’t have you all ready to play one way or another. I didn’t have you all ready to play, and that’s on me,” Eilert said.

West Virginia struggled offensively and defensively, shooting 38.2% from the field and committing 15 turnovers, while allowing Texas to shoot 51.4% from the field and 46.9% from three on 70 shot attempts.

“Yeah, I mean, that’s 29 points off turnovers. Six assists to 15 turnovers. And look at their 28 assists [to] five turnovers. Wow. That’s the game right there. They were the aggressor. 100% the aggressor. They took it to us as a physical game,” Eilert said.

The Mountaineers made just three three-pointers on 15 attempts, compared to Texas’ 15 on 32 attempts.

“You look at the three points, three for 13, three for 13 and they’re 15 for 32 and it’s a numbers game at that point and that’s hard to recover from,” Eilert said.

Now, the Mountaineers will have a quick turnaround, traveling to Ft.Worth to face TCU on Monday.

“We have to flush it and understand that, know they’re number one in the country and fast breakpoints, and then they get downhill and they really turn people over,” Eilert said when asked what he told the team in the locker room and what the team has to do now.

“If we’re loose with that ball, it could be very ugly in Fort Worth. So I told him, I said it was on me. One way or another is on me. I didn’t have you all ready to play. I’ll take it on the chin here with myself and as a coaching staff, one way or another, we weren’t ready to play, and that’s on us.”