MORGANTOWN - It's not difficult to understand why West Virginia's Mountaineers are the lowest ranked of the nation's undefeated teams.

Blowouts are almost non-existent. In their last four games, the Mountaineers' largest margin of victory was 10 at home against Mississippi. Within the Big East, the Mountaineers are in the middle of the pack in scoring offense, in the lower end in free throw percentage and steals and near the bottom in field goal percentage defense.

Yet, as Al Davis would appreciate, these guys just win, baby. They are undefeated at 11-0. They are at the top of the young Big East season at 2-0. They are No. 2 or 3 in Rating Percentage Indexes.

All is going well - unless you're looking for style points.

"We are just not putting anybody away,'' said WVU coach Bob Huggins. "We are younger than what people realize, which has something to do with it. But when we get ahead, our execution suffers.''

Huggins points to his team's attention span.

"Sometimes,'' he said, "they look at me like I have three heads.''

He also, though, points to another factor.

"We have more guys [than most teams] that can spread the floor,'' said the coach, "but we don't have any great shooters.''

Indeed, of those playing significant minutes, Kevin Jones has the highest shooting percentage at 59. Most of his shots, though, are of the point-blank variety. As a team, WVU is shooting 46.2 percent.

The Mountaineer players, to their credit, aren't blowing off the statistics. To a man, each seemed more concerned after a thrilling 63-62 win over Marquette on Tuesday than elated - especially staring at a Friday date at No. 4 Purdue.

"We've been getting by on athleticism and talent,'' said WVU point guard Joe Mazzulla. "We have to use these next two days to get back to the way we know how to play and use it against Purdue.

"There has to be a carryover from practice to the floor, to where we win more comfortably and feel better about ourselves after the game.''

Devin Ebanks shook his head in regard to the Marquette win.

MORGANTOWN - It's not difficult to understand why West Virginia's Mountaineers are the lowest ranked of the nation's undefeated teams.

Blowouts are almost non-existent. In their last four games, the Mountaineers' largest margin of victory was 10 at home against Mississippi. Within the Big East, the Mountaineers are in the middle of the pack in scoring offense, in the lower end in free throw percentage and steals and near the bottom in field goal percentage defense.

Yet, as Al Davis would appreciate, these guys just win, baby. They are undefeated at 11-0. They are at the top of the young Big East season at 2-0. They are No. 2 or 3 in Rating Percentage Indexes.

All is going well - unless you're looking for style points.

"We are just not putting anybody away,'' said WVU coach Bob Huggins. "We are younger than what people realize, which has something to do with it. But when we get ahead, our execution suffers.''

Huggins points to his team's attention span.

"Sometimes,'' he said, "they look at me like I have three heads.''

He also, though, points to another factor.

"We have more guys [than most teams] that can spread the floor,'' said the coach, "but we don't have any great shooters.''

Indeed, of those playing significant minutes, Kevin Jones has the highest shooting percentage at 59. Most of his shots, though, are of the point-blank variety. As a team, WVU is shooting 46.2 percent.

The Mountaineer players, to their credit, aren't blowing off the statistics. To a man, each seemed more concerned after a thrilling 63-62 win over Marquette on Tuesday than elated - especially staring at a Friday date at No. 4 Purdue.

"We've been getting by on athleticism and talent,'' said WVU point guard Joe Mazzulla. "We have to use these next two days to get back to the way we know how to play and use it against Purdue.

"There has to be a carryover from practice to the floor, to where we win more comfortably and feel better about ourselves after the game.''

Devin Ebanks shook his head in regard to the Marquette win.

"We had a chance to close them out in the first half and didn't,'' he said. "We have to come back and clean some stuff up.''

He was asked about a positive statistic from the MU game: the 40 points scored in the paint. It was if he didn't even hear the question.

"We have to clean up,'' he said. "It really started in our walk-through [before the Marquette game]. We didn't play hard in the walk-through and it converted to the game. We have to do a better job with that.''

How?

"We have to do a better job with our rotations,'' Ebanks, the team's third-leading scorer with a 14-point average, said. "We have to make sure everyone knows where to go. After that, we have to have a good defensive presence.''

Even Tuesday's game hero and team leading scorer, Da'Sean Butler, who hit the game-winning shot with 2.3 seconds left, wasn't thrilled. He was asked about being undefeated.

"It feels good,'' he said. "Granted, we didn't do the things we are supposed to do ... We won, but I'd have liked to have won a little bit differently. We had them 7-0, they called a timeout and we didn't take care of business. Kind of disappointed about that.''

Kevin Jones said he's past ready for WVU to put a team away.

"Oh yeah,'' he said. "Man. I mean, yeah. In this [Big East] league, though, every team is tough. Every game is tough. We just have to stick it out. Sometimes you just grind it out and hope for the best.''

The best, he said, is yet to come for his team.

"Our best basketball is still ahead of us,'' Jones, the team's second-leading scorer with a 15.7 average, said. "We have to work on a lot of stuff. I'm sure we'll do that in the next couple of days as we prepare for Purdue.''

"We don't have to prove anything,'' Ebanks said. "We have to show we know how to play both on offense and defense. The rest will take care of itself.''

Reach Mitch Vingle at 304-348-4827 or mitchvin...@wvgazette.com. Follow him at http://twitter.com/MitchVingle.