If we were to tell you that Kansas State got its second conference victory of the season against West Virginia, you'd probably ask how many points PJ Haggerty dropped to make that happen.
The answer? Zero. The Wildcats' star guard was sidelined fully for the first time this season, but the team was able to come up with the victory regardless. Kansas State coach Matthew Driscoll talked about rallying without the star of the show at the helm.
"As the guys started to play, they really had to figure out how to play without him," Driscoll said in his postgame interview. "I thought we were really sloppy, and we looked a little disheveled. So we called a timeout. We ended the first half scoring six of our last eight possessions, so I really felt comfortable that we figured out kind of how to play without PJ a little bit and what that’s gonna look like. So I had a good feeling that the second half was gonna be much better, and it was."
Kansas State was largely inoffensive outside Haggerty for most of the year, so getting production without him was a sign of progress for Driscoll.
"When you play with such a great scorer, you get a little bit of awe, and then all of a sudden maybe the ball finds you," Driscoll said. "I think that was the most critical thing tonight for our guys is he ain't out there, so somebody else has got to take that on. Nate [Johnson], David [Castillo], and CJ [Jones] did a really nice job."
Above all, Haggerty's absence forced other players to step up. Driscoll spilled a moment of redemption for freshman forward Andrej Kostic, who had eight points off the bench against the Mountaineers.
"We set a flare screen against TCU for Andrej. He took one dribble, and then he gave it up, and I got on him really hard. That's what people don't understand," Driscoll said. "A freshman asked me, 'Why are you coaching me so hard?' And I said, 'Because I don't want to coach you next year. I want you to know [these things] so that you can coach the new guys.' So if I let you think you're just a freshman, then I've got to coach you next year if it doesn't get better. I coached Andrej really hard, and tonight he took that extra dribble, bumped that dude off him, and he banked that little four-foot layup off the glass. I thought we had a lot of growth in different areas, which is really important."
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