MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - There are questionable calls by officials in every basketball game. There are questionable decisions by every player and coach in each of those games as well. Every once in a while, however, you have a player do something downright boneheaded, and that’s what Devin Ebanks provided in the win over Villanova.

You knew the situation, every fan in the stands knew the situation, four of the starting five and the entire bench knew the situation. Somehow, someway, the only person in Wachovia Center who was not aware of the situation was the man who possessed the ball that would determine if the situation changed or remained the same.

The Wildcats’ Corey Fisher decided just under eight seconds left in the game was the perfect time to push himself above double digits scoring by heaving in a three-pointer that left the arena rocking and the game tied.

Tied because it was a three-pointer, not a one-point WVU lead because it was a long two. Ebanks, however, did not know this. He thought Fisher hit a two, so he thought his Mountaineers entered their final possession trying to maintain a lead rather than break a tie.

If Da’Sean Butler had known that Ebanks was clueless about the situation, he never would have allowed the sophomore to keep the ball past mid court. Butler would have taken the ball himself, as he did later in overtime, and ensure that whether he succeeded or failed in his attempt at heroics, it would be his shoulders that would bear the burden of determining the game’s outcome.

Instead, Butler watched as Ebanks blew by his man to break the poor Villanova press and get in position to drive to the basket or kick it out to a teammate for a jumper to win the game. Not a bad set of circumstances, as it has been Ebanks lately who has shown a late-season knack for getting to the rim or getting fouled on his way.

 

But this young man thought his team was winning. He did not think it was the slightest bit strange that with a one-point lead and just a few seconds left, no one from the other team had attempted to foul him. It’s safe to say if he were down by one, Jay Wright would not look up at the scoreboard and tell his men, “Forget it, we gave it a good effort, but let’s just let him dribble out the clock and we’ll head home.”

It’s also safe to say Ebanks did not look up at the scoreboard at all.

From the court, I could see the 6-9 forward dribbling aimlessly and I took my eye off my camera just long enough to notice that the clock read 2.8 seconds, when I refocused on my camera, I could see in Ebanks’s eyes that he too had just realized the same thing and launched one of the more desperate shots I’ve ever seen.

It was about as desperate as Butler’s launch at the end of the Syracuse game, only instead of rebounding a missed free throw with two seconds left at the other end of the court, Ebanks had eight seconds to take his time with whatever shot he chose. Eight seconds may not seem like a long time to WVU fans who watch their own fail at the five-second Papa John’s shoot out every home game, but to a college basketball player it’s more time than they need to do exactly what they planned.

And therein lies the problem. It was obvious in the final seconds that Coach Bob Huggins was trying desperately to get a timeout called, and somehow not one of the three officials could see or hear the big man in black. Huggins saw that his sophomore did not know the situation, and he wanted to fix that in a team huddle. No timeout granted.

With that in mind, there were many reasons we expected to hear from Ebanks when he explained after the game what happened on that final possession. The excuses ranged from thinking Huggins was calling a timeout to not being aware of how much time was left. No one expected to hear him say he simply did not know the score.

Butler said after the game he was yelling out, “It’s a tie!” at his teammate. Coaches tell their players to communicate on the court, but I don’t believe that is one of the phrases you learn in practice.

The worst part is, Ebanks practices a mid court heave before just about every game. You almost thought he was a sure bet to make that desperate shot and send WVU home with a win five minutes earlier, but you also thought it was a sure bet that the players on the court would know the same information about the game that the casual fan knew.

Sadly, this was not the case.

Happily, it did not matter. If the Mountaineers had been beaten in overtime, Ebanks could have taken much – though not all when considering the first half – of the blame for the team’s seventh loss.

Wellington Smith says the entire team laughed about it right before overtime, but somehow I doubt the validity of that statement. After the game, however, Huggins and Butler could laugh. Ebanks could laugh.

And he could find no better, nor more accurate, words to describe his actions than “boneheaded.”