The West Virginia Mountaineers took down the Princeton Tigers 63-53 to advance to the second round of 32 in the NCAA tournament.
West Virginia used its best field goal shooting performance in an NCAA Tournament game at 52.5% and a dominant third quarter to advance to the second round of the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2021.
The West Virginia Mountaineers (25-7) will face the No. 1 seeded Iowa Hawkeyes (30-4) on Monday night at 8:00 EST at Carver Hawkeye Arena, in Iowa City.
Head Coach Mark Kellogg said in his press conference on Sunday afternoon, before the second round that his team has been aggressive all year long, and have been really good defensively, and that they can grind out games if they need to just like they did in the win against Princeton.
West Virginia is one of the nation’s best teams at forcing turnovers. The Mountaineers’ plus-8.75 turnover margin leads the nation. They are second nationally in steals per game at 13.8, and force 23.9 turnovers per game, third best in the country.
Coach Kellogg also mentioned that playing Oklahoma earlier in the year is helping them prepare for a high powered Iowa Hawkeyes team.
Iowa is led by star player Caitlin Clark who holds multiple records at the D-1 level. Clark is currently shooting 38% from 3 point range, hitting about 5.2 3 pointers a game. While averaging 31.8 points this season.
Iowa is 30-4 in games where they score over 58 points, The Mountaineers are undefeated when scoring over 72 points this season.
For West Virginia, along with JJ Quinerly who averages 19.9 points per game and Jordan Harrison who averages 5.1 assists per game are leading the offense, Lauren Fields leads the team in 3 point shooting, where she hits 32% of her shots. When West Virginia shoots above 45% they have gone 18-0 this season.
Pre/Half/Post game coverage will be hosted by Quinn Robie, joined by Joey Bray, Nico Caretto, and Gabe Schon. Tanner Mountz (Play By Play) and Aaron Parker (Color) will be on the call.
The U92 broadcast can be heard on 91.7 FM locally, u92themoose.com, an Alexa At-Home Device, or the RadioFX and TuneIn apps
Photo Credit: WVU Athletics