Chilling wit my homies #wvucheer #bunnywv @WVUWBB pic.twitter.com/2SRB8d0hZF

— Mr. Bunny WV (@bunny_wv) April 2, 2015

West Virginia played again and won again last night and it was an actual thriller. I’m not lying or embellishing. Seven ties and sixteen lead changes and a frantic finish to regulation.

WVU, which erased a four-point deficit with a pair of layups in the final 30 seconds of Sunday’s overtime win against Villanova, trailed by eight points in the second half and by three with 1:26 remaining against the Owls (20-17).

WVU’s Linda Stepney went 1 for 2 at the foul line to make the score 53-51 with 1:09 remaining, and Temple ran the shot clock and missed at the buzzer. Tanaya Atkinson rebounded the miss with 44 seconds left and then put the ball back up rather than back it out and force WVU to foul.

She missed, and Montgomery grabbed the rebound. Out of a timeout, Fields missed a jumper with 25 seconds left. WVU was lucky to have a foul to give, and the Owls took the ball out of bounds under the basket instead of taking free throws. WVU hounded the inbound play, first forcing the ball out of play and then tying up possession for a jump ball that kept the ball with Temple.

On the third attempt, Alliya Butts was trapped on the sideline and had the ball stolen by Crystal Leary. She passed to Holmes, who was fouled and made two free throws. Holmes was shooting 61.8 percent for the season and was 15 for 30 in the first five WNIT games.

“I was nervous,” she said. “The whole tournament I felt like my free throws weren’t that good. The whole year they weren’t good.”

Temple had one more chance in regulation and not only drove the full length of the floor before Butts missed a layup, but had two offensive rebounds and two additional chances under the basket. The ball went out of bounds with 0.4 seconds to go and the Temple bench hollering at the officials.

“We got shots at the basket that didn’t go in,” Owls coach Tanya Cardoza said.

This was fun. Temple’s a young team that found itself along with inspiration late in the season, and West Virginia is an older team that’s doing the same. They were playing for something Wednesday, and Temple wilted next to the head while WVU warmed up to it.

The Mountaineers never went away, though Temple never quit trying. The Owls led by six in the second half and then missed a jumper and a pair of 3-point attempts on one 82-second possession. The fourth shot attempt was thwarted, but WVU was called for a foul, yet Temple missed two free throws — and that was a theme, to the tune of 3 for 12 after halftime. WVU scored … but then turned the ball over twice on careless plays and fell back by eight points, the largest deficit of the game.

And then the Mountaineers didn’t turn the ball over in the final 19 minutes of play.

There was more.

It wasn’t a particularly pretty game, and the offenses started to break down and/or vanish late. Players got antsy and coaches were feeling it too, and the game sort of evolved into guard play, where both teams are strong, and one-on-one or ball screens. Yet when the game needed a moment, on a night when the teams combined to miss 92 of 135 shots and WVU was 14 for 34 on layups, a simple, sharp step-back jumper by Averee Fields accompanied by a free throw did the trick for WVU.

The three-point play propelled the Mountaineers to a 66-58 victory at before 3,025 at the Coliseum and Saturday’s championship game.

“They way they clogged up the middle made it hard to run the plays we typically run,” Fields said. “A lot of times it was one-on-one or a two-man game. I saw I had a little bit of an opening, and I was confident I could hit that shot.”

The fear of the drive forced Erica Covile to take extra steps to protect the paint. Fields then hopped back just right of the foul line before swishing her jumper, her seventh basket in 11 shots. The point at the foul line, where she was 6 for 7, put the Mountaineers ahead 60-55 with a minute to go and started the celebration in a building that has seen five wins this postseason.

“The three points,” Carey said, “really helped us.”

Fields was a force with 20 points on 7 for 11 shooting, eight rebounds and three assists. Bria Holmes did as she does and pieced together 22 points on 27 shots. The star, though, scored four points. Lanay Montgomery had 24 rebounds and eight blocked shots. No WVU player — man or woman — has ever hit those marks in the same game. Not since 1985 has a woman grabbed 24 rebounds. Jerry West in 1960 was the last men’s player to do it. (The records, respectively, belong to Olivia Bradley and to Mack Isner and West). Montgomery was two rebounds shy of the WNIT record.

Now it’s on to the Charleston Civic Center for Saturday’s 3 p.m. championship game against UCLA … 18-18 UCLA. The game will be televised by CBSSportsNet. There’ll be a challenge to match of top the crowds WVU has had the past two games, and they mattered in both outcomes. No clue whether the Bunny will be there. It popped up in a tunnel in the second half and people started flocking for autographs, and I thought it was apropos of everything. Turns out this Bunny is real and does cameos all over campus.