This is a nice story on Smith. It just goes to show you how serious some people take games. I think some folks need to get a life.

The Charleston Daily Mail Wrote:WVU forward living and learning
By Mike Casazza
Daily Mail sportswriter
May 7, 2008

MORGANTOWN -- The brain and the body heal differently in sports. Hurt an appendage and there's a fix, a rehab and a timetable for return. It's formulaic. Finite.

Mental boo-boos are not the same and quite often the only way to mend what the mind has marred is to confront the same situation and thrive where you once ripped.

Trouble is, if one is unfortunate enough to go through a cerebral collapse, the good fortune of fixing the foundation isn't guaranteed.

Wellington Smith, the gifted forward on West Virginia's men's basketball team, will submit himself as an example.

He knows people remember him leaping out to defend Pitt's Ronald Ramon as Ramon buried a game-winning 3-pointer in February.

He'd dropped his guard for a moment and double-teamed one player to leave Ramon open. He vowed to never let that happen again, knowing, though, he might never get a chance to make good on that promise.

Well, in March it was Smith again leaping out to defend another decisive 3, this one by Xavier's B.J. Raymond. It fell through the hoop with the shot clock expiring to give the Musketeers a 78-74 lead in overtime of the Sweet 16 game they would win. The middle of the court had become cluttered and Smith got stuck. Raymond capitalized with 30 seconds to play.

There is no arguing Smith's value on the team. He's the best shot-blocker, particularly on help defense, and among the best rebounders as he patrols the all-important weak side. The likelihood is he'll be in the team's starting five next season and if he's not, he's certainly in the group of players Bob Huggins will trust the most.

Chances are then that when WVU finds itself in another one of those tight moments at the end of a game -- and you know it's going to happen -- Smith will be out there with his teammates and the memories of the past.

It's part of the healing process.

"It's always harder growing mentally, but I think it's already made me mentally stronger," he said last week at the team banquet. "It is hard because there's always some doubt. You always think about your mistakes, but everyone make mistakes. The good thing is there's always another game."

Smith speaks openly about his experiences, often because he has no choice.

"I just had somebody interview me and say I was behind the two toughest losses of the season," Smith said with a shrug suggesting disbelief.

But he's not scared of perception. Smith admits to succumbing to curiosity - "I get on the message boards." - because he wonders what is happening outside the sometimes isolated world in which he lives.

"People's opinions are people's opinions," he said. "I can't really change them. I can't control what comes out of people's mouths."

Well, he could. He just doesn't.

The end of the Pitt game was a multi-faceted breakdown. Smith did go help guard a guy driving to the basket, but only after someone botched a screen at the top of the key to give the player with the ball some space. With time winding down and a two-point lead in his pocket, Smith can't be completely blamed.

He still jumps on the grenade, though.

"I'd never been in that situation before," he said.

The finality of the Xavier game, to say nothing of the environment postgame that was more like postmortem, prevented a full discussion of that demise. Something always seemed strange about what had happened and Smith quietly revealed Raymond was not his responsibility.

"It's people's perceptions and what they remember," he said.

A good point since few people remember Smith's role as a freshman when Coach John Beilein used him in specific situations, typically at the end of a half or a shot clock, and Smith would zip through a set and find himself alone under the basket, usually for an easy layup.

They don't remember one of this season's most fulfilling stories when Smith played his best game in the one after Ramon's shot.

They instead remember the defensive lapses against Pitt and Xavier and not any number of other plays that could have swung the game in WVU's favor, especially critical missed free throws by players not named Smith.

"It's probably because of the fact I didn't play a lot last year and everyone sees me as a new player, kind of like a freshman, making mistakes and doing stupid stuff," he said. "But again, it's just people's opinions and I can't change them."

But again, he could and this time he's planning on it.

"I don't really care that people think that about me and a lot of them are going to say I lost the Pitt game and the Xavier game," he said. "It's really up to me to make sure it never happens again."

I wish him better luck next year. But I think he'll make his own luck. He sounds like that kind. :ncaabbs: