WVU freshman Matthews understands his role, sees it expand

SUBSCRIBE today to stay up on the latest in Mountaineer sports and recruiting.

West Virginia understood that St. Joe’s was going to use some zone looks.

That meant shots could be there.

So with the injury to point guard Beetle Bolden, the rotation was one man short and that opened the possibility for some minutes for somebody that could knock those down.

Freshman Emmitt Matthews had seen a total of four minutes to that point in the Monmouth game and attempted only a single shot but he had been doing something that caught the attention of Huggins. The wing was simply doing what he could do on the basketball floor.

Sure, it seems easy enough but is one of the biggest challenges for most newcomers.

“The best thing about Emmitt is he doesn’t do a bunch of stuff he can’t do. He kind to satays with what he can do and that’s hard coming from high school,” Huggins said. “A lot of these guys were able to do very much what they wanted to do in high school.”

But this isn’t high school anymore and Huggins played off that to give Matthews a message.

“I told him the other day Dorothy this isn’t Kansas anymore,” Huggins said.

Or Washington in the case of Matthews, but his willingness to stick to what he is effective at is what got him on the floor in meaningful minutes. A total of 12, with 10 of those coming in the first half.

In that time, Matthews hit 2-4 shots from the field for his first career points including an and-one. It was a glimpse to what both Huggins and recruiting analysts saw that made Matthews one of the fastest rising prospects in his class during his senior year.

An athletic wing that has the ability to score off the bounce and create mismatches. He’s not there yet at this level, but he isn’t supposed to be.

That performance led to 21 minutes against Valparaiso and while he only hit 1-5 shots he continued to play within himself and not get out of the framework of what Huggins wants. He finished with 5 points and 5 rebounds.

His role only continued to grow against Rider scoring a career high 11 points.

“I try to stick to what I can do. Being here with a coach like Huggins he’s going to make me work on my weaknesses but also build on my strengths,” he said.

At this stage he believes those strengths are rebounding the basketball and hitting open shots, two items he feels very comfortable managing. Although he’s only a freshman, he understands that there are people that are simply better than him in some areas while he brings other things to the table.

“I just wanted to find my way in the program,” he said. “It’s working just doing what I do best.”

Matthews only continues to learn chemistry with his teammates which should only help as well.

And if he can continue that he could remain on the floor as well as he continues to do exactly what he can for the time being instead of instead what he can’t.

It’s certain got his coach to notice.

“He’s going to be a really good player. And he may even be a really good player this year,” Huggins said. “He’s a great kid that works really hard.”

Enter the contest by clicking on the following link and choosing to subscribe to the channel: http://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=VideoGlide