MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — West Virginia’s 37-7 win against BYU was highlighted by the Mountaineers’ solid play in every phase.
While the defense kept the Cougars off the scoreboard until after the game had all but been decided, the Mountaineers’ offense continued to operate at a high level in what marked the fourth straight contest WVU has scored at least 34 points in.
Along the way, West Virginia gained 567 total yards for its highest output in eight games against Power 5 competition this season.
“We’ve played pretty good since the bye week and it’s as much health as anything,” WVU head coach Neal Brown said. “I’ve said this before — I really felt like we were going to take off offensively.”
Though the stretch after the bye week began with back-to-back losses to Houston and Oklahoma State, West Virginia combined for 73 points over those two games, while displaying a much-improved downfield passing game.
During that time, West Virginia felt it could get more from its ground game, which has been the case over the last two contests, evidenced by the Mountaineers’ 622 combined rushing yards in wins at Central Florida and against BYU.
Over that stretch, leading rusher CJ Donaldson has 233 yards and three touchdowns on 31 carries, upping his yards per attempt average by 0.7 in the process. True freshman Jahiem White has also assumed a more featured role and has 221 yards on 25 attempts. For the season, White has 416 rushing yards on only 50 carries for an average of 8.3 yards.
Both Donaldson and White went over the 100-yard mark Saturday, with White gaining a career-best 146 yards on a game-high 16 carries. The Mountaineers finished with 336 rushing yards.
“This game is really hard to play as a true freshman. There’s a reason you don’t see it a whole lot,” Brown said. “Usually the ones that are able to do it and the guys that we’ve had that have played football as true freshman like [offensive linemen] Zach Frazier and Wyatt Milum, they’re usually pretty special. He has a chance to be special. Where he’s at right now and what he can be, there’s a big gap.”
Yet there’s no denying White’s ascension has been instrumental to the continued growth displayed from an offense that struggled for much of September despite the Mountaineers winning four straight games to end that month at 4-1 overall.
WVU played nearly all of its 17-6 win over Pitt in Week 3 without starting quarterback Garrett Greene, who then missed all of the following week’s 20-13 win over Texas Tech. Nicco Marchiol managed both contests, which combined with strong showings from the Mountaineers’ defense, allowed West Virginia to defeat its closest rival and a Big 12 opponent it had yet to defeat in four previous tries under Brown.
Greene returned September 30 and showed minimal lingering effects from an ankle injury as he helped lead WVU to a 24-21 victory at TCU with 80 rushing yards and a pair of touchdowns. Still, the signal-caller completed only 10-of-21 passes for 142 yards in that game, and it wasn’t until a 41-39 loss at Houston 12 days later that West Virginia began to showcase a legitimate vertical passing game.
Greene passed for a career-high 391 yards in that game and had 11 completions of 15-plus yards. He followed it up with 249 passing yards and a pair of touchdowns during a loss to Oklahoma State that could largely be attributed to the Mountaineers inability to slow Cowboys’ tailback Ollie Gordon.
More recently, Greene had his most efficient performance by completion percentage against UCF when he hit 14-of-23 passes for 156 yards, and followed it up by completing 12-of-24 passes for 205 yards with two TDs against the Cougars.
Though Greene’s completion percentage of 53 falls well below the FBS average, he has thrown only two interceptions on 183 passes, including one at Houston that went in and out of the hands of his intended target.
“From our running back room to our tight end room and wide receivers room, we have playmakers everywhere,” Greene said. “It’s my job to be point guard and get the ball to those guys into open space, put balls on guys and let them go make plays.”
West Virginia also greatly benefited from its veteran offensive line having its way against the BYU front.
The Mountaineers established control of the line of scrimmage early and often despite playing without right tackle Doug Nester, who missed the matchup as a result of an injury he suffered a week earlier.
“Running for 300 [plus] is really impressive. That’s a testament to how good our offensive line is,” Greene said. “For Doug to be out and our o-line to still play like that … that is the best offensive line group in the country and there’s nobody I’d rather play behind.”
While WVU used an early 2-yard run from Donaldson on fourth-and-1 to help setup its first touchdown and dictate the tone for the contest, the Mountaineers were plenty productive enough passing as well.
Greene had touchdown passes of 12 yards to Fox in the first half and 43 yards to Kole Taylor in the second half. He also led a nine play, 78-yard drive that allowed Michael Hayes to kick a 23-yard field goal on the final play of the first half.
That series was highlighted by a 38-yard back shoulder throw to wideout Devin Carter and also featured a 17-yard pass from Greene to receiver EJ Horton.
“Garrett is growing week in and week out because of making decisions. That shows some growth,” Brown said. “The 2-minute drive at the end of the half, he didn’t put the ball in jeopardy. They were dropping eight and sometimes seven and he did a really good job with less than a minute of making his way downfield without putting the ball in jeopardy.”