MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — A full student section stormed the court. Four Mountaineers jumped up to stand on the scorers table. Hugs, handshakes and high fives were exchanged by members of the WVU coaching staff.

West Virginia collected their third victory this season over a Top 10 team in a 64-57 triumph over Iowa State in front of a sellout crowd Saturday at the Coliseum.

An announced crowd of 14,444 on Jerry West Day did their part to get the Mountaineers over the line in the final minutes as they closed the game on a 15-8 run over the final three minutes.

“It was amazing,” said WVU fifth year center Eduardo Andre. “They get you going. When they are yelling, you want to go even harder. You don’t get tired because you are feeding off the crowd. That’s what we need every game. We need a sold-out crowd every game.”

“I am excited for our fan base,” said WVU head coach Darian DeVries. “They had a hand in this one tonight. There’s some very tough places to play in the Big 12. We want our place to certainly be one of them. I felt like it was tonight and the crowd did their part. We had to do our part. But I thought the crowd was very engaged and helped us down the stretch.”

Wren Baker and Darian DeVries celebrate WVU’s 64-57 win over No. 2 Iowa State: pic.twitter.com/opIkwtkck8

— Joe Brocato (@joebrowvm) January 19, 2025

Senior guard Javon Small made just one of his first six shots from the floor in the game but he scored a dozen consecutive points in the closing stretch. Small finished the contest making 9-of-16 shots from the floor with 27 points, seven rebounds, four assists and four steals.

“He is the Big 12 Player of the Year,” Andre said.

“It is not all about scoring for me. It is just whatever I’ve got to do to help my teammates,” Small said.”

“Like a lot of great players, and it is really fun when you are a coach of one of those, you can tell when they are in that zone,” DeVries said. “You can see it in his eyes. He wanted to take that game over. He even had another three with three minutes to go. I have seen Javon in practice and in games, when he gets in a zone, he is really, really good.”

After a 1-1 week, the Mountaineers will almost certainly reenter the AP Top 25 poll on Monday. West Virginia (13-4, 4-2 Big 12) is tied for fourth in the Big 12 standings and they check in at No. 30 in Sunday’s NCAA NET ratings.

If the Mountaineers can maintain their level of play throughout the second half of their regular season schedule, an NCAA Tournament berth seems very much in reach.

“Like we have talked about with our team from day one, don’t limit yourself on anything. We’re going to come and we’re going to compete. These are the things we feel like we need to be good at to win. Let’s go try and do that,” DeVries said.

“I have never been a guy that was like, ‘Hey, we need to win this many games to be successful’. It is more about how we can maximize this group. If you can do that, your goal is that those wins follow. I think our guys are giving us everything they’ve got. They don’t play perfect every night and I don’t ask them to do that. Just leave it out there. They’ve done a great job of doing that so far this season.”

“We understand how big and how important the game was,” said Small. “We just can’t come out here on Tuesday against Arizona State and blow it off. We just have to keep building up momentum and racking up dubs.”

HOUSTON — — J’Wan Roberts scored a season-high 22 points, L.J. Cryer added 18 and No. 10 Houston beat West Virginia 70-54 on Wednesday night for its ninth straight win.

Roberts had 17 points in the first half on 8-of-10 shooting. Emanuel Sharp, who finished with 14 points, added 12 as Houston took a 40-27 lead into halftime.

Houston (13-3, 5-0 Big 12) shot 49% overall and was 11 of 26 on 3-pointers in winning its 32nd straight home game.

Amani Hansberry scored 16 points and Javon Small added 13 points and eight assists for West Virginia (12-4, 3-2). The Mountaineers shot 44% and were 9 of 22 on 3-pointers.

After trailing 18-13, Houston used a 20-3 run to open a 12-point lead on Roberts’ hook shot with 4 1/2 minutes remaining in the first half.

Takeaways

West Virginia: Small, who leads the Big 12 in scoring with 19.8 points per game, started 3 for 4 from the field — including three 3-pointers in the first six minutes as the Mountaineers built a five-point lead. But he went 1 for 7 the rest of the way and was scoreless in the second half as Houston pressured him.

Houston: The Cougars improved to 1/3 in Quad 1 games this season. Houston could have at least another 10 opportunities for Quad 1 wins over its final 15 regular-season games.

Key moment

West Virginia used a 12-2 run to cut Houston’s lead to 51-48, but the Cougars responded with a 14-0 spurt that started with a putback dunk by Ja’Vier Francis. The spree was capped by a 3 from Milos Uzan to give Houston a 17-point lead with seven minutes left.

Key stat

The Cougars forced 12 turnovers and converted them into 25 points.

Up next

Houston visits Central Florida on Saturday, and West Virginia hosts No. 2 Iowa State the same day.

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Senior guard Javon Small has been so consistently good this season that it’s almost easy to not fully appreciate what he’s doing on the floor.

Small has made the special, ordinary this season in his first year with the Mountaineers, and the latest example of that came in the win over No. 2 Iowa State. Small finished with 27 points on 9-16 from the field with 7 rebounds, 5 assists, and 4 steals to help engineer the upset.

And that’s against an Iowa State team that features a tough challenge with their perimeter defense.

“He’s been just incredible all year. I think he’s the best guard in the country right now. For what we’re asking him to do and the way he put the team on his back there late,” he said.

Small is the primary focus of every opponent that West Virginia has gone against since Tucker DeVries went down with an upper-body injury eight games into the season and he continues to deliver. He continues to play a ton of minutes in the process and has still been able to make plays despite all of the attention that he has received from the opposition.

Against Iowa State, Small took over down the stretch scoring 12 of the final 13 points and doing it in a variety of ways by either hitting a key three-pointer or getting to the rim or the foul line.

Speaking to his mindset, Small wasn’t even aware that he reeled off that feat.

“Since day one I’ve always tried to do what I can for my team to win and if it takes me to score 12 of the last 13 points that’s what I’m going to do,” Small said.

That wasn’t a directive from the coaching staff, Small just got into a zone and took the game over. It’s something DeVries has seen Small do in practice and when he gets there it’s tough to stop him.

“He’s certainly special and I hope people certainly enjoy the time they get to watch him here,” he said.

But the most impressive thing about Small is the fact that the only thing that matters to him is getting the win. Even though he’s stuffing the stat sheet, he doesn’t care about anything but how he can help his team accomplish the goal of winning basketball games.

“All I’m thinking about is just winning,” he said.

With his numbers, Small has positioned himself in the race for Big 12 Player of the Year considering that he’s averaging 19.8 points, 5.2 rebounds, 5.2 assists and playing over 36 minutes per game. But he’s focused on what matters the most to him and his teammates.

“What I love about him is he doesn’t care about winning that award. He wants to win and that’s all he talks about. That’s all he talks about with his teammates is being better in areas we need to win. He’s never come into a timeout asking for the ball not one time,” DeVries said.

And if he continues to play like this, Small could not only continue to lead his team to wins but might just receive some recognition for his efforts as well.

“I don’t ever think about it. The only thing I’m worried about is winning at the end of the day. You can only win Big 12 Player of the Year if you win,” Small said.