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West Virginia guard Sherman finding his stroke

Sherman has developed more confidence in his second season with the West Virginia Mountaineers basketball team.
Sherman has developed more confidence in his second season with the West Virginia Mountaineers basketball team.

Taz Sherman was struggling with the adjustment to college basketball.

The high-scoring junior college all-American was brought in to hit shots and stretch opposing defenses but struggled to find his footing in his new surroundings at West Virginia.

After averaging just short of 26 points per game and shooting close to 40-percent from three at Collin College, Sherman had only connected on 29-percent from deep in his first 24-games last season.

There were certainly some impressive scoring efforts during that span with 15 of those games resulting in double figures in that department but he couldn’t quite find his trademark shot.

“If I make shots, I make shots and if I miss I’m going to keep shooting until I make shots,” Sherman said.

It was frustrating in the sense that shooting the ball is what Sherman was recruited to do. But then a road trip to Baylor in mid-February helped him find what had been missing. Despite losing the game, Sherman was 5-9 from three-point range and 6-11 from the field overall.

“I felt like I really started to find my stride. Just play your game, that’s why they brought you here,” Sherman said. “One game that finally proved to me I could play here.”

Over the final seven games, Sherman connected on 40-percent of his three attempts and started to develop more confidence in what had gotten him to Morgantown in the first place. It’s understandably a big leap, but one that took the senior guard some time to find his role.

“Was trying to find my niche in the system and trying to figure out where I could do what because you’re not going to have the ball every single second of the game like in junior college,” he said.

While the season was cut short due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Sherman got the taste of success he needed to work on further expanding his game. He added more to his repertoire off the dribble in order to showcase his versatility instead of serving as primarily a spot up shooter.

That meant understanding reading the defense and screens on when you pick your spots.

The results have been quite impressive as teammate Jordan McCabe saw him make all eight of his three-point attempts in a recent scrimmage and consistently put the ball in the basket in practice.

It’s a testament to his skill, and his work ethic.

“We have to be prepared and ready to make a shot when necessary and of course offensively be aggressive because at the end of the day that’s why they recruited me,” he said.

Because of changes to the NCAA rules, Sherman could have the rare opportunity after the season to return for yet another year despite the fact he is a senior. It will be something he weighs with his coaches and family when the time come but for now is focus is squarely on this year.

“I’ll just weigh out of options and see what the best decision is for me and my family. And go from there but I’m worried about this season first and foremost and trying to get a national championship,” he said.

That was on display over the first three games with Sherman connecting on 13-24 shots from the field, while hitting 7-11 from three-point range. It's the type of start that Sherman wanted to have and now it's about building off that with even more confidence.

"Taz is a much, much better all-around player than he was given credit for in the beginning. He passes the ball well, he’s a much better defender than advertised and he’s been our most consistent shooter," head coach Bob Huggins said.

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