WASHINGTON – So West Virginia is the ninth-best team in the Big East? If so, that's going to be some tournament at Madison Square Garden in March.

West Virginia's Da'Sean Butler (1) goes to the basket against Georgetown's Greg Monroe (10) during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game Thursday, Jan. 22, 2009, in Washington. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)

Da'Sean Butler scored 27 points, a relentless defense forced 19 turnovers and the Mountaineers knocked hard on the door of the conference's eight ranked teams Thursday night with a 75-58 win over No. 12 Georgetown.

In a game in which nearly every basket was hard-earned — and steals were sometimes canceled out by quick counter-steals — Butler stood out by going 11-for-18 from the field. The Mountaineers shot 58 percent in the second half, while the No. 1 scoring defense in the Big East limited the Hoyas to 33 percent shooting after the break.

Georgetown went 2-for-16 from 3-point range for the game and again had trouble on the boards, allowing 16 second-chance points on West Virginia's 14 offensive rebounds.

Darryl Bryant added 13 points, and Alex Ruoff had nine assists and 10 points, including an eye-popping driving dunk that gave the Mountaineers a 59-48 lead with 5 1/2 minutes to play. His play came shortly after a 12-3 run that put the lead in double digits for the first time.

West Virginia (14-4, 3-2) has won eight of 10, with the only two losses coming to ranked Big East foes Connecticut and Marquette.

Chris Wright scored 13 points, DaJuan Summers had 12 and Greg Monroe added 11 for the Hoyas (12-5, 3-3).

The Mountaineers were supposed to signal the start of the softer part of a Georgetown schedule that so far has been the toughest in the country. Five of the Hoyas' previous six opponents were Top 20 teams, but even an unranked school is a handful in the Big East this season.

Getting an open shot was hard work from the start. The Mountaineers missed eight of their first nine and trailed 9-2 before turning the tide with Butler's three-point play and a four-point play resulting from an intentional foul following a steal at midcourt.

The Hoyas shot relatively well at first — when they could get a shot off. Georgetown turned the ball over 11 times in the first half and went more than five minutes without a field goal near the end of the half.

The Mountaineers used that Georgetown dry spell to go on a 9-0 run and take a 31-22 lead, highlighted by Devin Ebanks' steal and two-handed dunk. Monroe stopped the momentum with a steal and layup under the West Virginia basket after a Mountaineers rebound, and the Hoyas went into the break trailing 31-26.

The Mountaineers built the lead to nine points again early in the second half, but three-point plays from Wright and Monroe and a nice backdoor pass from Monroe to Omar Wattad helped close the gap before West Virginia began to pull away for good.