AMES, Iowa – For a fleeting moment, it looked like West Virginia might be able to stem Iowa State’s rising tide of momentum and get back on track at Jack Trice Stadium on Saturday night.
As the final seconds ticked away in the third quarter, the Mountaineers finally gained some positive yardage when Will Grier hit Gary Jennings for 21 yards on a second-and-23 screen play. For the first time since the first quarter, West Virginia faced a third down with less than 5 yards to gain – the elusive third-and-manageable. Specifically, it was third-and-2 from the WVU 31.
This is where the Mountaineers figured to have the advantage all night. Iowa State was only 118th in the country on third down, allowing opponents to convert 46 percent of the time. West Virginia was fourth in the nation, hitting on 57 percent of its third downs.
But at this point in the game, West Virginia was a miserable 1-for-8 on the money down. Even though there was still a quarter left to play and Iowa State nursed a 20-14 lead, it felt very much like the type of situation where the game was in the balance.
Despite the leverage of the situation, Mountaineers offensive coordinator Jake Spavital elected to take the ball out of his Heisman hopeful’s hands. Grier handed off to Martell Pettaway. The Cyclones snuffed it out and stopped Pettaway in his tracks at the line of scrimmage. West Virginia was forced to punt, and never again crossed its own 30-yard-line as Iowa State put the game on ice in the final period.
The first question: given who your quarterback is, why run in that situation?
Looking at the numbers, Spavital’s decision was actually justifiable. Heading into the game, Iowa State allowed 10 first-down runs on 12 third-and-short opportunities this season. The Mountaineers’ ground game had been very effective in those situations, too. Before Pettaway’s carry, West Virginia converted six of its seven third-and-short situations on the ground this year.
One also needn’t look at previous games to see why a run call was appropriate. West Virginia tried passing on both of its manageable third downs in the first quarter. Grier was sacked on both occasions.
“They give you a favorable box to run it in to,” Spavital said. “I felt like it was a light box, and you’ve got to take advantage of that. If teams are going to be concerned with our pass game and bracket everybody, we’ve got to be efficient in our run game.”
There was just one problem.
Though the Cyclones dared the Mountaineers to run on third down in the first quarter – on one third-and-4, there were only four men in the box before a fifth blitzing safety sacked Grier – that wasn’t the case in the third quarter.
West Virginia came out in its version of a jumbo package, subbing in tight end Trevon Wesco and little-used fullback Logan Thimons as an H-back. Iowa State was ready. For one of the only times in the game, the Cyclones overloaded the box with eight players lined up within 3 yards of the line of scrimmage. A ninth, cornerback Brian Peavy, was responsible for Gary Jennings, but shifted his eyes into the backfield as soon as Jennings went into motion.
With this being the situation, the Mountaineers had two options that would have been better than what resulted.
They could have used one of their three remaining timeouts to call something new – maybe even a run out of a formation that cleared the Cyclones off the line — or have Grier check into a passing play. With the number of plays available in the jumbo set presumably being smaller than the rest of West Virginia’s personnel packages, the former likely would have been the best choice.
Whether it was Grier, Spavital or Dana Holgorsen who failed to diagnose Iowa State’s pre-snap advantage, the play was all but doomed from the moment it was snapped. The Cyclones had more defenders than the Mountaineers had blockers, and outside linebacker Willie Harvey is the one who came in untouched to stuff Pettaway.
Given the way things were going for the West Virginia’s offense, perhaps a first down in that situation wouldn’t have amounted to much thereafter. The Mountaineers finished the game with 152 yards, their worst performance in 23 years.
But it also could have been the moment where things finally clicked again. Championship teams find ways to win games in which they’ve been outplayed, and a touchdown drive could have paved the path to West Virginia’s great escape. It just would have taken a different third-down play call for that opportunity to present itself.