I need to talk about the vun-thee-vun today. It wasn’t long ago when WVU used the 1-3-1 zone as a staple defense and not as a tourniquet, as was the case last night. The gentle German rather liked talking about the intricacies of the bizarre defense which, frankly, fascinated me in both principle and application. Virtually no one played the 1-3-1 and the Mountaineers were even more unique in the way they played it.

Too concerned about shooters and not nearly concerned about opponents back-cutting their way to easy layups and kickouts, WVU was down 23-14 and allowing Notre Dame to shoot 10-for-12 (!) from the floor. Bob Huggins had to call two timeouts before his team scored two baskets and it looked, for some long and tense moments, as if the Irish were going to fight their way to 100 or so points.

Enter the 1-3-1.

And given that not everyone playing for Bob Huggins these days is all that familiar with what is essentially a junk defense – it’s a good bet some in the crowd of 13,126 know it better than WVU’s freshmen – well, someone had to take the reins.

“I was yelling at guys, trying to teach it as we went along,” Ruoff said. “We just kind of threw it in there, no rules. And I’m back there playing the back position, which I never did before. I think coach Beilein might have been proud of me.”

 Notre Dame actually scored on the first few possessions against the zone, though offensive rebounds helped and we were again reminded of the inherent weakness of the 1-3-1. The strength, though, became obvious because Notre Dame’s feverish pace cooled off, players were forced to slow down and think their way through possessions and the shooting percentage dropped to 57 percent at the half.

“We played it a little bit last year out there [in a 69-56 loss at the Joyce Center] and it was about the only thing that slowed them down,” Huggins said. “Alex knows what he’s doing and so does Da’Sean [Butler] and Cam [Thoroughman]. Then we just tried to coach [freshmen Devin Ebanks and Kevin Jones] through it. We kind of got [Notre Dame] standing around.”