Men’s College Basketball 2021-2022 Season Preview: West Virginia Mountaineers

The Big 12 had a successful year in men’s college basketball in 2020 as the Baylor Bears closed out the season as the national champs. It was a dominant run, and they truly were the best team in college basketball.

The conference comes into the new year looking strong from top to bottom, but there was some drama in the offseason with a few teams planning to leave for the SEC. Texas and Oklahoma will be headed to the SEC in the near future, but for this year at least it’ll be business as usual.

Like many other conferences around the country, Big 12 teams took advantage of the expanded transfer portal and loaded up with all sorts of new faces. Figuring out rotations will be especially important for this group so let’s dive in and take our best crack at deciphering the best players for each squad.

In this one, West Virginia.

(Check out our full college basketball season preview!)

West Virginia Mountaineers 2021-2022 Season Preview

2020-2021 record: 19-10 (11-6 Big 12), fourth in Big 12
Postseason: Lost in NCAA Tournament second round

Key Departures | West Virginia Mountaineers

• Emmitt Matthews (transferred to Washington)
• Derek Culver (playing professionally)
• Miles McBride (NBA)
• Jordan McCabe (transferred to UNLV)

Key Additions | West Virginia Mountaineers

• Malik Curry (transferred from ODU)
• Pauly Paulicap (transferred from Manhattan)
• Dimon Carrigan (transferred from FIU)
• Kobe Johnson (3 star recruit)

Returners | West Virginia Mountaineers

• Taz Sherman (13.4 PPG)
• Sean McNeil (12.2 PPG)
• Jalen Bridges (5.9 PPG/3.6 RPG)
• Gabe Osabuohien (1.7 PPG/4.4 RPG)
• Kedrian Johnson (1.3 PPG)

West Virginia Mountaineers Outlook for 2021-2022

Bob Huggins is a no-nonsense coach who keeps on ticking. The game keeps changing, and he changes with it. I’ve got all the respect in the world for him. He grabbed some hard-nosed players from the transfer portal who should fit well into his system and contribute immediately.

This team will revolve heavily around Taz Sherman. In their exhibition game against the Akron Zips, he went off for 29 points on 10-of-14 shooting. Obviously, we need to take exhibition results with a grain of salt, but we saw Sherman go absolutely bonkers plenty of times last year to know that he is the real deal. With McBride gone, he takes over as the alpha scorer. Sean McNeil, Malik Curry and Kedrian Johnson will factor into the backcourt rotation heavily while Dimon Carrigan, Pauly Paulicap and Gabe Osabuohien will play a physical brand of basketball in the low block.

(Check out our rankings of the top 100 teams and top 100 players for men’s college basketball in 2021-2022.)

Summary

Expect a big season from Taz Sherman while the rest of the rotation contributes in various ways. Jalen Bridges has a chance to breakout this year and potentially become the face of the program next year. Never count out a Bob Huggins-coached team.