Spiders Fall at #11 West Virginia

Sunday, December 13

Morgantown, WV

1:00 PM

University of Richmond

4-1,0-0Atlantic 10

West Virginia

6-1,0-0Big 12

Richmond

West Virginia

12/13/2020 | Men's Basketball

Box Score Chris Mooney Postgame Press Conference

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – The 19^th-ranked Richmond Spiders dropped their first game of the season Sunday afternoon at #11 West Virginia in a nonconference contest. With the loss, Richmond fell to 4-1.

Richmond committed a season-high 16 turnovers, leading to 19 Mountaineer points, and allowed West Virginia to shoot 58 percent from the field and 57 percent from three-point range, both season highs for WVU.

"They haven't shot that well too often in the last couple of seasons," said Spiders head coach Chris Mooney. "Maybe there were too comfortable because we were so concerned about their interior players and making sure we were in the passing lanes on the passes that went into the post. But you still have to be aggressive and firm when you're guarding your guy. If they shoot that well they'll be very difficult to beat, but a lot of that's our responsibility."

The teams stayed in close contact in the opening minutes before West Virginia hit six straight shots from the field to build a 20-14 advantage at the under-12 media timeout in the first half.

Richmond responded with a steal and layup by Jacob Gilyard, and moments later a layup by Blake Francis and a pair of free throws by Souleymane Koureissi narrowed the West Virginia lead to 23-20 with eight minutes remaining in the half.

The Mountaineers proceeded to take control of the game with a 29-10 run over the final seven-plus minutes of the first half, taking a 52-30 lead into the break. West Virginia, which entered the game shooting 39 percent from the field and 31 percent from three-point range this season, shot 66 percent from the field and 6-9 from three-point range over the opening 20 minutes.

Richmond turned the ball over 12 times in the first half, leading to 15 points for the Mountaineers. The Spiders entered Sunday averaging 11 turnovers per game.

A basket by Nathan Cayo to start the second half pulled Richmond within 20, but West Virginia responded with an 11-1 run over the next three minutes to put the game out of reach.

The Spiders were able to chip away at the Mountaineers advantage over the game's final 15 minutes but never were able to close the gap to less than 16 points en route to an 87-71 loss.

Tyler Burton scored 14 points, tied with Cayo for the most on the Spiders, and added a team-high 10 rebounds for his second career double-double and second in as many games.

Gilyard recorded six of UR's 13 assists to join Greg Beckwith as the only players in Richmond history with 500 or more career assists. (Gilyard now has 502. Beckwith has 573.) He also added four steals to give him 297 for his career, tied with VCU's Briante Weber for the fifth-most in Atlantic 10 history.

The Spiders will return to action on Wednesday at Vanderbilt. Tip time is scheduled for 1 PM and the game will be broadcast nationally on the SEC Network.