After a 72-65 win against UCF, head coach Darian Devries shared his thoughts on the game and the team’s journey this season.
Being down 47-25 at half, UCF upped the pressure right away in the second half, and closed the deficit to within 6 points with 5 minutes left.
“The last thing you want them to do is tense up and freeze in the moment and not stay aggressive. That was our biggest message was especially offensively, like guys we got to stay in attack mode,” DeVries said after being asked how he kept his team together during the comeback.
Javon Small had another big night scoring 25 points and contributing 9 assists. DeVries was asked if he had seen anything different in Small’s attitude prior to the game.
“Von’s hard to read sometimes you know, he’s pretty steady like all the time, not too high, not too low,” Devries also said, “You could tell he was being aggressive, he was doing everything he could to kind of get going.”
Being senior night, DeVries knew that this game was significant to his players.
“I know sometimes on senior day you don’t get to spend as much time with those guys, they have family and things so I thought it was really important that I got the chance to tell them how much they meant to us as a coaching staff and me personally for them believing in us and committing to come here when we didn’t have much of a roster put together,”
This win should guarantee a spot in the NCAA tournament for the Mountaineers. DeVries was asked about the expectation he had coming into the season and if he expected the success they’ve had.
“I don’t think you can really have one because nobody knows what a team is capable of,” DeVries also said, “That’s why I hardly talk about wins, losses, expectations from that standpoint at the beginning of the year because there’s so many variables that go into that.”
The next step for the Mountaineers is the Big 12 tournament as they were awarded the No. 8 seed, getting a first-round bye. They are set to play the winner of Oklahoma State vs. Cincinnati Wednesday, March 12.
