West Virginia to pressure Kentucky

By LARRY VAUGHT

CLEVELAND — West Virginia’s defensive goal never changes — apply relentless pressure and make a team turn the basketball over against its full-court press.

That plan won’t change against No. 1 Kentucky here Thursday night in the NCAA Tournament Midwest Regional.

“We want to try and make it as physical as possible with our press. We try to do that every game,” said West Virginia guard Jayseasn Paige. “We want to take it out of the ballhandlers’ hands. Nobody presses like us, either.”

West Virginia coach Bob Huggins knows his team, which leads the nation in turnovers forced and steals per game, must rely on the press to counter UK’s size.

“It's going to be a long day for us if we can't (force turnovers). I guess the risk is sometimes we open up the floor, but any time you double team somebody, somebody's going to be open,” Huggins said Wednesday. “I think the reward for us is we turn people over and sometimes at an alarming rate. And we've at times created live ball turnovers, which is really what we want, then we don't have to go play against a set defense, but I don't know. I mean, I have no idea whether we can turn them over or not.”

And what about Kentucky’s size advantage when the Moutaineers do press?

“I don't know what you do about that. I've thought about that, but I haven't really come up with an answer,” Huggins said.

West Virginia guard Juwan Staten, the team’s top scorer, is confident the press will work even against UK.

“Why wouldn't it? We've been playing this way all year, we've had success against everybody no matter what style or what type of players they have. That's the only way we play and it's just up to us to make it work,” Staten said.

He said he believes the press wears teams down in the second half much like UK did when Rick Pitino coached the Wildcats.

“In the first half everybody's pumped up and they're thinking that they're breaking our press and having success, but they don't realize that they using more energy. So in the second half when they have got to come out and try to do that same thing for 20 minutes and they don't have their legs or they're a little tired, then they start to have that effect on them and that's when we try to get even more aggressive on defense,” Staten said.

West Virginia guard Gary Browne said good decisions by opponents in the first half turn into second-half mistakes.

“They don't realize they don't have enough depth on their bench and the second half is going to catch up. Sometime during the game we can see it. We get real excited when things like that happen. I feel like the whole bench, the whole team can realize that and that's when we know, we go harder and more aggressive,” Browne said.

“It's good because we press every day, we press at practice, we press at shootaround, and that's the only way we get better at it. I feel like we don't get tired because we have 13 guys, we might not have the best five guys, like Coach said, but we have the best 13 guys, that's why it's hard for us to get tired.”

Kentucky coach John Calipari said Huggins made changes this year in the way his team plays.

“They're giving up two-point baskets, high percentage, which I've never seen a team have a field goal percentage that high and do this well. But they're creating havoc, they're taking you out of your offense, they're creating opportunities for tough shots or turnovers. They're playing very physical, they're coming in and letting you know it's going to be body to body, you had better be ready,” Calipari said.

“He looked at his team and he said, that's how we have to play. And offensively, we have to space this court, we've got to beat them on the dribble. It's what it's about, what team do I have, how do we have to play to have success, and he's got them believing. And again, they're a talented team now, they've got talent, but he's got them believing, which is special.”

Kentucky freshman guard Devin Booker said West Virginia’s press did not look “different” to him than others UK has faced. Both Booker and Ulis have taken care of the ball well against Louisville and Arkansas, two teams that like to press.

“I pride myself in not turning the ball over, so I've got to just make sure I'm focused and just handle the pressure. Just try to treat it like we did with Louisville and Arkansas and stuff like that, just focus on taking care of the ball,” Ulis said. “We have nine guys he (Calipari) plays, rotating in and out, two point guards, a lot of people who can handle the ball so that's going to be a little bit different with the rotation and stuff like that.”

“Our size also can be a big factor, I think. We've been working on a lot of different press attacks with some of the bigs up,” sophomore center Dakari Johnson said.

“I think our size and spacing will be good,” Booker said.

Kentucky sophomore guard Aaron Harrison said UK has to attack the press.

“It’s not really about securing the ball, I think we have to attack the press and get easy baskets and keep attacking it,” he said. “We haven’t played against that press, but we have played against pressing teams and I think we do really well against pressing teams. I think we enjoy just playing, period. I do think we enjoy fast paced games.”