Dan Dakich trashes WVU basketball team

ESPN’s Dan Dakich is on television to analyze basketball games. His assessment of the WVU basketball team seems a little…off.

Dakich, a former college basketball coach who actually has some intimate history with the Mountaineers, went off an a tangent against the Bob Huggins-led team on Sunday.

Unlike most television commentators who have been extremely complimentary of West Virginia’s style of play this season, Dakich went in a different, negative route.

"“I was disappointed when I heard how good they were,” Dakich said. “They can’t score. If they don’t get steals, they can not win. In a one game deal, if they can’t turn you over, if you pass-fake and go around them, they won’t be that good.”"

There’s no way the WVU basketball fanbase agrees with that. Dakich’s co-host Miles Simon didn’t agree with him, either.

"“They played the best teams in the Big 12 and they got steals,” Simon responded. “That’s what they do.”"

Now, Dakich actually brings up a good point.

Scoring struggles have cost the Mountaineers this season.

West Virginia enters the NCAA Tournament with a 26-8 record. The Mountaineers got to this point thanks to their defense, not so much by their scoring ability.

Collectively, the team is shooting 45-percent from the field this season and averaging 79.2 points per game.

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In the eight losses, the Mountaineers collectively shot 40-percent from the field, five percentage points from their season average. WVU also averaged just 64.8 points per game, more than 14 points than its season average.

There’s no doubt that there is a correlation between the Mountaineers’ best and worst games this season. It’s all based on how the offense performs.

West Virginia’s worst game of the season was at home against Texas where it netted just 49 points, while shooting 31.1-percent from the field.

But through the Big 12 Tournament, the Mountaineers seemed to be playing their best basketball of the season. There was the dramatic victory over Oklahoma and the Mountaineers shot 55.6-percent from the field in their opening win over TCU.

WVU’s leading scorer Jaysean Paige has been limited in the Big 12 Tournament, but he still has the best offensive ability on the team. Picking up his slack has been big man Devin Williams, who scored 31 points in the Big 12 title game against Kansas.

Paige and Williams are the only players on the team scoring in double figures with 13.9 and 13.3 points per game, respectively.

Dan Dakich needs to realize that those guys are perfectly capable of carrying the load. However, that’s not really the case. The Mountaineers have plenty of capable scorers in Daxter Miles (9.7 ppg), Jevon Carter (9.7), Tarik Phillip (9.4) and Jonathan Holton (8.9).

But what’s great about this team is that any player can get hot at any time. Nathan Adrian, Esa Ahmad and even Teyvon Myers may catch fire at the right time this tournament.

West Virginia is definitely a team predicated on defense, forcing 617 turnovers this season while creating 338 steals. So, yes, Dan Dakich, the Mountaineers will get their steals and they will win games in this tournament.

Also, the Mountaineers have the scorers to keep them competitive. It’s actually because of Dakich that WVU has been so competitive over the past decade-and-a-half. He resigned as head coach of the WVU basketball team less than two weeks after getting the job.

However, because Dakich left, the Mountaineers were able to land John Beilein and then Bob Huggins. They both have brought the program into elite status.

Meanwhile, Dakich is spewing nonsense on national television.