MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Much-maligned through the first half of the regular season, West Virginia’s offensive line has displayed an abundance of improvement since the Mountaineers’ lone bye week.
It’s no coincidence what many would consider the unit’s top two performances against TCU and then-No. 22 Iowa State helped coincide with a pair of wins for West Virginia, which produced its two best scoring and yardage outputs of the season against FBS competition in those contests.
“We’re being much more physical at the point of contact,” WVU head coach Neal Brown said. “We’re straining to finish blocks. We cleaned some things up schematically during the bye week from a protection standpoint where we’ve been able to help our tackles. That’s been a benefit.
“Run game wise, we’re doing a better job with the details consistently. We had some times early in the year where we were did our footwork correctly or had our hands in the correct spots or had our eyes where they should be, but we didn’t do it consistently. Now we’re doing it at a much higher percentage and that’s helped.”
Against the Horned Frogs, and more specifically the Cyclones, quarterback Jarret Doege performed at a higher level than what the senior did through the majority of his first six games. In the two most recent games, Doege completed 51-of-74 passes for 627 yards. He was sacked once at TCU, while Iowa State never brought him down behind the line of scrimmage.
Senior tailback Leddie Brown surpassed 100 rushing yards in the two Big 12 Conference wins, which WVU produced 351 rushing yards on 70 attempts in, including a season-best 229 yards on the ground at TCU.
“Over the bye week, we all got together as an offense in general and really discussed what we wanted for the rest of the year,” left guard James Gmiter said. “We wanted to make sure everybody was on the same page and everybody was bought on. All five of us didn’t flinch. Everybody had the same answer.
“The biggest part of the improvement was we all trust each other and we all know how much work we put in over the offseason. We know that we were capable of better. It finally started clicking against TCU when we started talking about sacrifice, who sacrificed for us and what we were sacrificing to be in this position.”
While Brown has said on several occasions West Virginia doesn’t have adequate depth along its offensive line, Gmiter, a junior, is one of five mainstays that has helped the unit jell.
Sophomore center Zach Frazier, sophomore left tackle Brandon Yates, junior right guard Doug Nester and true freshman right tackle Wyatt Milum joined Gmiter in playing every offensive snap against the Horned Frogs and Cyclones.
“We come off the field and immediately start communicating,” Gmiter said. “We know what’s going on each side of the ball, so if something happens on the other side, it can get switched. We played 81 snaps altogether against Iowa State, and with no seniors, that’s a huge step for an offensive line. Unless it’s a group of seniors, you don’t really see four-plus that can play 81 snaps. But you have underclassmen that are playing that, so that’s a big step.”
Frazier has performed at a high level for much the season and others around him have stepped up recently. Milum, who missed the most recent loss at Baylor with an injury, was WVU’s offensive lineman of the week against ISU.
Yates and Nester have also been better, with part of Nester’s performance likely attributed to not playing with a cast on his right hand, as was the case early on.
While West Virginia didn’t run the ball the way it desired to over the first six games and Doege was under more pressure than what he’s been in the last two, the adversity the offensive line faced during the bye week could have led the unit in one of two directions.
“It was difficult, but what [offensive line coach Matt Moore] kept reiterating to us was that we can’t let it get to us,” Gmiter said. “We can’t look at it. You may be able to see it, but you have to dismiss it and you can’t let it feed into the room and can’t let the negativity seep in and really start spreading. If it seeps in and starts spreading, that’s when you get bigger issues that can’t be fixed.”