The West Virginia Mountaineers came into 2012 with high hopes. After
winning The Big East Title in their last year as a member of the
conference last season, The Mountaineers headed West for the money of
The Big 12 Conference. After a 70-33 beat down of The Clemson Tigers in
The 2012 Orange Bowl, The Mountaineers were expected to contend for The
Big 12 Title. The Mountaineers were ranked no. 11 in The Associated
Press’ Preseason Poll and they were living up to the hype as they
started the season with a record of 5-0. Included in that hot start was a
48-45 victory over The Texas Longhorns on October 6 in Austin. Senior
quarterback Geno Smith was an early favorite to win The Heisman Trophy
as he threw 24 touchdowns and zero interceptions in those first five
ballgames. But the cakewalk was over on November 13 when The
Mountaineers faced The Texas Tech Red Raiders. The high-powered offense
of The Mountaineers that had scored 70 points earlier in the season
against The Baylor Bears was shut down in a 49-14 loss to Texas Tech.
West Virginia would go on to lose five games in a row and once the smoke
had cleared all of the hype that was surrounding Smith and The
Mountaineers was gone.
West Virginia rebounded under head coach Dana Holgorsen to win their
final two regular season games over The Iowa State Cyclones and The
Kansas Jayhawks to finish the regular season with an overall record of
7-5 while going 4-5 within The Big 12. West Virginia headed to New York
City as they looked to close out the season against their former Big
East Conference foe, The Syracuse Orange at The Pinstripe Bowl.
Coming into the game The Mountaineers were averaging nearly 40
points per contest on offense. The snowy elements at Yankee Stadium in
The Bronx didn’t favor the fast paced offense of West Virginia. The
Mountaineers were 0-for-10 on third down which was highlighted by two
safeties on Smith in Syracuse’s 38-14 victory.
Going into 2013, The Mountaineers must get faster and tougher on
defense. Defensively The Mountaineers gave up 38.1 points per game this
season which was up nearly 12 points from 2011. The recipe for defeating
West Virginia is simple; pressure the quarterback and force him to
think in the pocket instead of anticipating. Syracuse used the same
formula in last season’s 49-23 victory over The Mountaineers at The
Carrier Dome. This season The Mountaineers were ranked 112th in total
defense out of 124 Football Bowl Subdivision schools. That is a far cry
from a team that was 33rd in total defense for 2011. The change from
conferences hurt The Mountaineers as the speed of The Big East is not on
the same level as it is in The Big 12.
Prior to coming to West
Virginia, Holgorsen was the offensive coordinator at Oklahoma State
University. Now that Holgorsen is back in The Big 12 with West Virginia,
he must recruit Texas and Oklahoma in the fashion that he did when he
was at Oklahoma State when he coached the likes of current Jacksonville
Jaguars wide receiver Justin Blackmon.
The Mountaineers are
hopeful that the current trend of schools leaving The Big East and not
being able to enjoy the same success in football in other conferences
won’t fall on them. In 2004, The Miami Hurricanes and Virginia Tech
Hokies left The Big East to join The Atlantic Coast Conference. The
Boston College Eagles followed them in 2005. Of those three teams only
The Hokies have won The ACC while both The Eagles and Hurricanes have
each had at least three head coaches since 2005. If The Mountaineers do
not get faster and tougher on defense they will be mediocre in The Big
12 as they will constantly look up to The Texas Longhorns and Oklahoma
Sooners in the standings.
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