MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Couple West Virginia’s 37-10 win over No. 16 Kansas State with Texas’ 41-34 overtime win at Oklahoma State, and the Mountaineers (3-2 Big 12) find themselves one game behind the Wildcats and Iowa State (4-1) in the league standings. The top two squads at the end of the regular season advance to the league championship game.
The Mountaineers hit the road to face the Texas Longhorns Saturday. The game will kick at noon eastern and will be broadcast by ABC.
?️ ?️#Big12FB ???????? ?????? for Saturday Nov. 7:
▪️@KU_Football at @OU_Football will be at 2:30 pm CT on ESPN2
▪️@CowboyFB at @KStateFB will be at 3 pm CT on FOX
▪️@WVUfootball at @TexasFootball will be at 11 am CT on ABC
— Big 12 Conference (@Big12Conference) November 1, 2020
You are in good hands
Drops plagued WVU receivers in their seven-point loss at Texas Tech last week. Seven passes fell to the turf in Lubbock that were catchable balls, many in key spots. WVU head coach Neal Brown did his best to drown out the noise on that subject throughout game week.
“I apologize to anybody I didn’t ‘like’ anything or retweet anything last week. That was the best decision I made last week was to stay off social media. Our creative people are going to be (mad) I said that,” said Brown.
“We never lost belief in them. I think that is really important for everybody to understand. We keep calling pass plays because we believe they are going to get open and we believe they are going to catch the ball. We believe we are going to protect and we believe the quarterback is going to deliver the ball where it is supposed to be in a catchable manner.”
“It is really nice,” said WVU receiver Bryce Ford-Wheaton, who caught 3 passes for 104 yards. “But we still remember all of it. We are going to play with a chip on our shoulder for the rest of the year and remember what people were saying about us and step up to the plate.”
True freshman Reese Smith continues to earn playing time. He has caught at least one pass in five of West Virginia’s six games. He has reeled in 11 passes for 128 yards and caught 2 passes for 23 yards Saturday.
“He is dependable. He is a great practice player. He is well-invested and has as good hands as anyone on our football team. He is good out of breaks and makes good decisions. There is a lot of trust there. He will continue to grow and improve.”
West Virginia’s tight ends are slowly making more contributions in the passing game. Mike O’Laughlin reeled 2 passes for 32 yards Saturday. He and T.J. Banks have combined for 13 catches in 6 games. That may not seem like much, but WVU tight ends totaled 11 catches in the entire 2019 season.
“They didn’t show up in the stat sheet as much as they have probably the last two games. But they played and played really well to compete against those defensive ends.”
Legg steps in
While starting kicker Evan Staley was injured on kickoff coverage late in the first quarter, Charleston native and sophomore Casey Legg assumed the kicking duties and had a perfect afternoon. Legg connected on field goals of 25 and 45 yards and was a perfect 4-for-4 on extra points.
“I am really proud of Casey Legg coming in and hitting the long field goal. He is a great kid and a great representative of our program and of our state.”
Fields making up for lost time
Senior linebacker Tony Fields II racked up a game-high fifteen tackles for the Mountaineers. Last Saturday in Lubbock, he was ejected on a targeting call on the final play of the first quarter. The play wasn’t called targeting on the field but was called after review.
“What I told my father as soon as the game was over last week was they took three quarters away from my senior year,” Fields said. “I felt like I was robbed. So that’s what I went into this game with. I had an extra chip on my shoulder.”
Despite missing three quarters at Texas Tech, Fields is still WVU’s leading tackler at just under nine stops per game.
With a second chance, Mahone gets his
Sean Mahone could have easily had a pair of interceptions Saturday. In the first quarter, both he and Nicktroy Fortune had easy looks at a tipped pass that fluttered in between them. Fortune grabbed it for the pick but Mahone took advantage of a second chance. He made an acrobatic play later in the quarter for his second career interception.
“In practice, coach always talks about high-pointing stuff,” Mahone said. “As soon as I saw the ball going up, I was like, ‘I’ve got to get me one’. I think it was the second play of the game, I was about to have my first pick and Nick (Nicktroy Fortune) took it from me. So I had to get me one.”