It’s Big 12 Week in this wild and wonderful state, and with No. 25 Baylor coming to christen WVU’s entrance into a bona fide football conference, we’re pretty sure Saturday’s game will live up to the wild part.
But for Dana Holgorsen and No. 9 West Virginia, will the results be wonderful?
"Baylor’s got a great offense, and if you think we’re just going to shut ’em down, you’re nuts," the coach said Monday. "Offensively, I think we played just OK last week, and if you play just OK going against an offense like Baylor, then you’re probably not going to have enough points to win."
Holgorsen, the offensive savant, is understandably preoccupied with trying to determine whether it will take 45, 55 or 65 points to beat Baylor. So preoccupied, in fact, that he leveled somewhat dissonant comments about the impact of this über-hyped week on his team.
About internalizing football preparations and blinding his team from the hubbub, Holgorsen said, "we’ll do our best to ignore the outside." Then moments later, he could not ignore the fans who were rather subdued for the just-completed Maryland game.
"I thought the energy and excitement for last week was very average, not only from a players standpoint but also a coaches standpoint and from an atmosphere standpoint," he said. "I expect that to be totally different this week."
To be fair to the snoozy ticket-buying legions, when a nonconference schedule is highlighted by a Maryland team on a 4-11 streak, it’s hard to get jacked. Jeff Sagarin currently ranks WVU’s schedule strength at 94th nationally, a mark that will climb every week hence forth as the Mountaineers prepare to navigate the Big 12 gauntlet.
"There’s a lot of anticipation, not only within the state of West Virginia but across the nation. There will be a lot of eyes on us," said Holgorsen. "We’re looking forward to a very festive, fun Saturday."
With an over/under of 130.
Follow on Twitter @AllanTaylorWVU Email comments to ataylor@wvradio.com