West Virginia defeats TCU 62-53 in the Big 12 championship as Jordan Harrison’s MVP performance powers the Mountaineers toward a top NCAA seed.
The West Virginia women’s basketball team captured the Big 12 Tournament championship Sunday with a statement win over No. 1 seed TCU, beating the Horned Frogs 62-53 and flipping the script after two painful regular-season losses.
For the Mountaineers, the victory wasn’t just about a trophy. It was about redemption.
Earlier this season, TCU edged West Virginia twice, including a heartbreaking 51-50 buzzer-beater in January followed by another loss in February. When the two teams met again with a title on the line, No. 2 seed West Virginia came in determined to finish the story differently.
Senior guard Jordan Harrison made sure of it.
Harrison delivered 21 points, four assists and three steals, earning Big 12 Tournament Most Outstanding Player honors while setting the tone for West Virginia’s relentless defensive effort.
“It was very important,” Harrison said after the win. “We knew the things that were on the line. That's something that we talked about: We wanted to try to get those two games in Morgantown.”
West Virginia’s defense did the rest.
The Mountaineers held TCU to just 33.3 percent shooting, forcing difficult shots throughout the afternoon and frustrating a Horned Frogs offense that had been one of the most dangerous in the conference.
Head coach Mark Kellogg joked that his team simply needed to score a little more this time.
“We knew we needed to score more than 50,” Kellogg said with a smile. “So we found a little bit of offense to get to 62 ... and 62 at times for us can be good enough.”
The championship also carried deep personal meaning for Kellogg, whose mother passed away in December.
“She would have been here,” Kellogg said. “She would have loved every second of this.”
TCU star Olivia Miles, the Big 12 Player of the Year, finished with 17 points but spent stretches battling foul trouble, limiting her ability to fully take over the game.
Horned Frogs coach Mark Campbell credited West Virginia for the win.
“They played an awesome game today,” Campbell said. “They did a heck of a job defensively and they just outplayed us. We've had great battles with them over the last couple of years and today they were the better team. We just didn't have it.”
Even with the loss, TCU remains in excellent shape for the NCAA Tournament.
“This hurts, but I'm so proud of what our program's accomplished,” Campbell added. “It's so stinking hard to win the championship. The regular season? That's 2½ months of grinding. This group has done a heck of a job. We just didn't do enough today.”
For West Virginia, the Big 12 title could mean something even bigger: a chance to host NCAA Tournament games in Morgantown for the first time in decades.