Big second half from Konate lifts WVU past Valparaiso, 88-76

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West Virginia (3-2) earned its third victory of the season by defeating Valparaiso (3-3) Saturday afternoon, 88-76, at the Coliseum.

The Mountaineers and Crusaders engaged in a back-and-forth battle for most of the game, but a 24-point second half from Sagaba Konate helped West Virginia get its second straight win.

Konate finished with career-high 26 points on 9-of-15 shooting and Esa Ahmad scored a career-high 30 points.

Derrik Smits led Valparaiso with 20 points on 9-of-12 shooting.

West Virginia jumped out to an early 4-0 lead with a put back from Lamont West following a missed three-pointer from Sagaba Konate and a layup from Esa Ahmad after a Valparaiso turnover.

The Mountaineers quickly stretched that lead to 12-5 less than five minutes in as Esa Ahmad scored seven early points on 3-of-4 shooting.

Valparaiso began to battle back and came within a basket of West Virginia as the Mountaineers went cold offensively, making just 1-of-10 field goals at one point and were held scoreless for over three minutes.

The Crusaders eventually went on runs of 6-0 and 5-0 to eventually take their first lead of the game with a jumper from Ryan Fazekas. The two teams went back-and-forth for most of the rest of the first half as West Virginia took a 39-36 lead over the Crusaders at halftime.

After the game’s first 20 minutes, Ahmad led all scoring with 16 points on 6-of-9 shooting as the two teams each committed six first half turnovers. Konate had just two points in the first half as he went 0-of-2 from the field, committed two fouls and played seven minutes.

Konate got off to a hot start in the second half scoring West Virginia’s first 13 points of the half which included three three-pointers.

The back-and-forth action continued and West Virginia would take a 63-57 lead with a three-point play from Andrew Gordon. Valparaiso later responded with back-to-back layups before Konate nailed his fourth three-pointer of the day to extend West Virginia’s lead to 66-61 near the 10-minute mark.

This began a 9-0 run for the Mountaineers as West Virginia began to pull away, leading 72-61 with 6:42 remaining.

A three-point play from Ahmad came after a three-pointer from Markus Golder and from there, West Virginia was able to hold off Valparaiso for the win.

The Mountaineers will take on Rider Wednesday at the Coliseum for a 6:30 p.m. ET tip-off.

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