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James leads Marquette to rout of West Virginia

Jan 13, 2007 - 10:34 PM MILWAUKEE (Ticker) -- Dominic James and Marquette were not flummoxed by West Virginia's 1-3-1 defense.

James scored 21 points in an outstanding all-around performance to lead the Golden Eagles to an 81-63 Big East Conference rout of the 21st-ranked Mountaineers.

James chipped in six assists, five rebounds and five steals for Marquette (15-4, 2-2 Big East), which was coming off a 73-69 triumph at No. 22 Connecticut on Wednesday.

A 5-11 sophomore, James connected on 3-of-5 3-pointers for the Golden Eagles, who made 8-of-14 attempts from the arc. "We didn't really want to give them an opportunity to set up their zone," James said. "We wanted to get out quick. They do a good job in their 1-3-1 and can shut teams down, so every time we got a chance we wanted to push it."

Fellow guard David Cubillan, a freshman, made all five of his shots from the field, including 4-of-4 3-pointers, en route to scoring a season-high 14 points.

"All week Coach (Tom Crean) has been telling us that (Cubillan) needs to get more shots," guard Jerel McNeal said. "We took that upon ourselves to drive more and then find him open. He came up big for us."

Overall, Marquette shot 53 percent (29-of-55) and limited West Virginia to 39 percent (19-of-45).

The Mountaineers (13-3, 3-2) had whittled a 15-point second-half deficit to 54-45 on a 3-pointer by Frank Young with 12:14 remaining, but the Golden Eagles countered with a 10-0 run. Wesley Matthews scored four of his 13 points during the burst.

Young scored 11 points to pace West Virginia, which nailed a Big East- and school-record 20 3-pointers in last season's game against Marquette but sank just 5-of-22 on Saturday.

"Individually, they are a good defensive team," Mountaineers coach John Beilein said. "They guarded us well, guarded our patterns well, and we didn't read some of the things we should have read."

Reserve center Jamie Smalligan, who had 10 points, was the only other player in double figures for West Virginia.

The Mountaineers, who allowed the Golden Eagles to shoot 61 percent (17-of-28) after the break, were outscored in the paint, 40-22, after getting outrebounded by a convincing 40-26.

"We had great dialogue at halftime and that is what you have to have," Crean said. "Most of the time you have to have some free flow in there. We needed to adjust a couple things at halftime to adjust against the zone."