MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia’s three-games-in-five-day stretch continues with Thursday night’s clash against Campbell.
The Camels, of the Coastal Athletic Association, are coming off a 96-54 loss at 24th-ranked Wisconsin on Monday night, and Thursday will continue their tour of power conference foes that also features upcoming trips to Wake Forest, Penn State and Minnesota, not to mention a game against 21st-ranked Gonzaga on Dec. 17.
Thirty-two-year-old John Andrzejek takes over a Campbell program this year after serving as Todd Golden’s assistant coach on last year’s national champion Florida Gators squad.
Andrzejek, who will be celebrating a birthday on Saturday, is the third-youngest coach in the country this year and his Campbell staff includes Joseph Yesufu, who completed his collegiate career at West Virginia last season.
Senior guard D.J. Smith, a Robert Morris transfer, led Campbell with 23 points in its season-opening loss. Smith is one of seven transfer portal additions who averaged nine points or better at the Division I level last year.
According to Blue Ribbon’s College Basketball Yearbook, Andrzejek wants to model his program after the Gators, who used “elite positional size, relentless rebounding and skilled shot-making guards to cut down the nets last April.”
The five Campbell started in the season opener included Smith, a 6-foot guard, 6-foot-4 senior Jeremiah Johnson, 6-foot-5 senior Cam Gregory, 6-foot-5 senior Muneer Newton, and 6-foot-9 sophomore lefty Dovydas Butka.
Johnson played last season at Green Bay, Newton at Delaware State and Butka at Pepperdine, while Gregory is one of the team’s four holdover players. The others are Tasos Cook, a 6-foot-2 senior guard, Broc Bidwell, a 6-foot senior guard, and Israel Yaw, a 6-foot-9 senior forward.
Meanwhile, West Virginia is coming off a season-opening 70-54 victory over Mount St. Mary’s on Tuesday night at Hope Coliseum.
North Texas imports Jasper Floyd and Brenen Lorient led the Mountaineer attack. Floyd matched his career high with 25 points, while Lorient produced an 11-point, 13-rebound, double-double to help new coach Ross Hodge get off to a good start with his first victory at West Virginia.
“Probably not super surprising, but the two guys who looked the most comfortable on the floor were the two guys who played for me and have been through 40 of these with me prior,” Hodge said of Floyd’s and Lorient’s play.
Chattanooga transfer Honor Huff contributed 16 points, although he misfired on eight of his 11 3-point field goal tries.
West Virginia forced Mount St. Mary’s into committing 20 turnovers and also benefitted from 25 fouls, resulting in 35 free throw attempts.
WVU used a starting lineup consisting of Floyd, Huff and Treysen Eaglestaff in the backcourt, with Lorient and 7-foot center Harlan Obioha up front. Obioha got into early foul trouble and logged just 17 minutes on Tuesday night against Mount St. Mary’s.
“I think everything is going to be a work in progress for a while,” Hodge explained. “There were some scouting report things we missed, and they made us pay.”
The Mountaineers got seven points off the bench from freshman forward DJ Thomas, four points from South Carolina transfer Morris Ugusuk and a free throw from freshman guard Amir Jenkins.
West Virginia (1-0) is playing the first five games of the season without St. Bonaventure transfer Chance Moore, who must satisfy NCAA transfer requirements, and Troy transfer Jackson Fields, who is still recovering from a preseason hand injury.
Hodge admitted after Tuesday night’s victory that he was forced to play some unusual combinations in the opener.
“You go into the game thinking we are going to play one way, and then we get into foul trouble, and I don’t know if we even practiced some of those four-guard lineups before,” he said. “You tinker with things, you adjust things, and you have your core idea how you think it’s going to go, but we’ll have to get better as the game goes on. We’ll figure things out as a group.
“The beauty of this team is you will see different guys show up in different spots and in different moments,” he concluded.
Thursday night’s game will tip off at 7 p.m. and will be televised on ESPN+ (Nick Farrell and Warren Baker).
Mountaineer Sports Network from Learfield radio coverage with Tony Caridi, Brad Howe and David Kahn will get things started with the Coca Cola Mountaineer Pregame Show at 6 p.m. on stations throughout West Virginia, online via WVUsports.com and the Varsity Network and WVU Gameday apps.
Tickets are still available and can be purchased by logging on to WVUGAME.com.
This will be Campbell’s first-ever visit to Morgantown.
