MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — When West Virginia welcomes Cincinnati at noon Saturday, it will be the seventh of eight straight Saturdays that the Mountaineers play before their only bye week this season at the end of October.
It will be the first of seven straight Saturdays the Bearcats play to close their 2026 regular season after Cincinnati was off last week.
That the Bearcats’ bye followed a 34-7 loss at Arizona and came directly after a lengthy return trip home from the west coast figures to be beneficial as they try to end a four-game losing streak in the series with WVU.
“The bye came at a good time,” UC head coach Scott Satterfield said. “We didn’t play well. We had to regroup and also it being such a long trip. They did a great job in practice last week. They attacked it better than last year’s team on the two bye weeks that we had.”
Last season, the Bearcats were off a week before their third and fourth games and edged Kansas 37-34 following their first bye, before losing to the Wildcats, 30-24, in the team’s 10th game that followed its second bye.
This time around, there was plenty to focus on improving after Cincinnati (4-1, 1-1 Big 12) was out-gained by 295 yards and shutout until inside 2 minutes remained during its 27-point loss at Arizona.
“Definitely room to improve. Very disappointed in the last outing,” Satterfield said. “You concentrate on trying to stop the pass in the last outing and they popped some big runs on us. We have to do a much better job of getting in our gaps and being where we’re supposed to be. It’s pretty simple really, but sometimes difficult to do in games. If you’re supposed to be in the A gap, you have to get there. If the guy is trying to cut you off, you still have to fight to get there. Getting into our gaps, but also tackling better.”
The Bearcats have one of the top rushing attacks in the Big 12 and average 230.8 yards on the ground. Until Arizona rushed for 238 yards on 5.8 yards per carry, UC had also been stout defending the run as it allowed 117.5 rushing yards per game on just over 4 yards per attempt over the first four contests.
In the matchup in Morgantown, UC will oppose the Big 12’s top rushing attack and one of college football’s most productive ground games. The Mountaineers’ 1,773 rushing yards are 393 more than the next-closest Big 12 team, while their 345 attempts are 94 more than any team in the league.
It’s safe to reason improved run defense was a focal point for Cincinnati since returning from Arizona.
“If a guy is out of his gap, that’s where they’re going to make you pay,” Satterfield said of WVU. “Truly, it’s all of them. It starts up front with the guys creating a little bit of havoc. Our linebackers have to play downhill and we have to get the safeties involved as well, because you have to get a lot of hats there.
“That’s the way most teams have tried to defend them and they’re not really slowing them down a whole lot. Everybody they’ve played, they’ve been able to run the football — close to 300 yards rushing per game. They’re fourth in the country behind the three [service] academies [Army, Air Force and Navy]. You have to treat these guys offensively like an academy type where they’re going to run, run, run. When you start committing to all that, they know they’re going to get some 1-on-1s out there and they have to try to hit those plays. You have to do a great job of trying to stay on top.”
WVU tailback Cam Cook is first among FBS players with 153 carries and fourth with 793 yards and has seven rushing touchdowns. Quarterback Michael Hawkins Jr. is ninth nationally with 672 rushing yards and first among quarterbacks. Hawkins has rushed 117 times and reached the end zone on 12, leaving him tied for first nationally.
Freshman tailback Amari Latimer is third on the Mountaineers in carries (33) and rushing yards (152) and enters off the most productive game of his young college career with 55 yards and a TD on 13 attempts last Saturday in a 52-31 loss to Arizona.
“You can’t just sit in the same defense every time,” Satterfield said. “But certainly to in order to stop the running attack, you’re going to have to involve the secondary, whether it be the corners or safeties. You’re going to have to get those guys involved, but also mixing it up, so they don’t have just a beat on calling plays. That’s the challenge. This is what they face every week when teams are trying to stop them in the same manner.”
One area where Cincinnati’s defense has thrived has been forcing fumbles, with the Bearcats atop the FBS in that category at nine. UC has recovered only three, but WVU head coach Rich Rodriguez knows ball security could be even more important than normal in this matchup.
“They’re really good at punching the ball out,” Rodriguez said. “They had an open date, so they’ve had an extra week to do some other stuff, so I’m sure we’ll see some things in all three phases we have not seen at all this year.”