11-16-2009, 01:26 PM
Monday November 16, 2009
In finish, WVU needs to 'stuff it'
![[Image: promo_382_0.jpeg]](http://dailymail.com/images/promo/promo_382_0.jpeg)
by Jack Bogaczyk
Daily Mail Sports Editor
CINCINNATI - In Bill Stewart's first season as West Virginia's football coach, the Mountaineers never played a ranked team - although the Mountaineers did squish No. 3 Oklahoma the previous January in his job-earning, Fiesta Bowl debut game.
This season, WVU hadn't played a ranked club until taking No. 5 Cincinnati to the limit in Friday's 24-21 setback at Nippert Stadium.
The road loss to the Bearcats (10-0, 6-0 Big East) changed the Mountaineer schedule's degree of difficulty significantly.
WVU's final two regular-season dates will (likely) be against poll-sitters.
Next up, in 11 days, is No. 8 Pitt (9-1, 5-0) at Mountaineer Field. Then it's off for a regular-season finale at Rutgers, which at No. 25 made the 2009 Associated Press poll for the first time Sunday.
After a 47-15 home embarrassment by Cincinnati in the season opener, the Scarlet Knights have reached an under-the-radar 7-2 (2-2). They are likely to be 9-2 when WVU (7-3, 3-2) arrives in New Jersey, because they visit Big East bottomed-out Syracuse and Louisville next.
(There's also the consideration that Rutgers pasted USF 31-0 last Thursday, and the Bulls have had their way with West Virginia - although few others of Big East quality - in recent years.)
So, with the winds and weather of late November and early December overdue, here's a message for Stewart's team:
Stuff it.
Through everything that played out Friday night at noisy Nippert - and it was only the fourth game in eight seasons in which West Virginia won the turnover battle (2-0) and lost - the Bearcats' ability to run through and around the WVU defense was the difference-maker.
UC sophomore Isaiah Pead made his second career start a memorable one, rushing for 175 yards. Since 2002, only two backs (2004, Leon Washington, Florida State, 195; and 2008, Sean McCoy, Pitt, 183) have run for more yards against WVU.
If West Virginia is going to play its way to success as the season winds down, it's going to have to stop the run. Pead's effort wasn't an aberration in recent history.
The previous week, Louisville's unheralded Darius Ashley ran for 164 yards against the WVU defense. The next challenge is Pitt freshman Dion Lewis, who leads Big East ground-gainers and had 152 yards in the Panthers' win over Notre Dame on Saturday.
Startling stat time:
In a 6-1 start, West Virginia allowed a total of only 604 rushing yards (86.3 per game). In going 1-2 since (losses to USF and Cincinnati sandwiching a ho-home home win over Louisville), WVU has permitted 606 ground yards (a 202-yard average).
"We weren't consistent in knocking down the run," WVU defensive coordinator Jeff Casteel said minutes after the loss at Cincinnati. "It was a problem all night. If you can't do that and do it well, it will end up coming back to haunt you.
"I thought overall our kids did a good job, but if had done better in the run phase ... We almost had them a couple more times. We just need to make a play when you've got to make them."
Casteel bemoaned Pead's 43-yard run on first-and-10 from the UC 24 with five minutes left that took Cincinnati, leading 21-14, to WVU's 33 and started the Bearcats toward their clinching field goal.
"We had a chance to make a play with 4-5 minutes left, and we couldn't get the guy on the ground," he said.
The WVU defense had taken done a really solid job taking away the Bearcats' major offensive weapons - receivers Mardy Gilyard and Armon Binns.
Cincinnati was averaging 325 yards per game through the air and 158 on the ground. Against WVU, the totals in those statistical lines, however, were 221 and 216.
"They're known as a passing team and that ran the ball, switched their game plan up," Mountaineer safety Robert Sands, who had his fourth interception of the season. "They ran it toward the weak side and got hat-on-hat on the weak side and found some open room.
"For the most part defensively, we did what we have to do. They live off big plays, and we gave up some big plays, but we also made some plays, too. Mostly, I thought, we played a good game ... "
The Bearcats, it seemed, took what the Mountaineers' 3-3-5 stack scheme gave them.
"Mardy Gilyard just had coverage all over him," said Cincinnati Coach Brian Kelly, who is 31-6 in three Bearcat seasons. "(WVU) doubled Binns. They can do it by virtue of their three-down (linemen) structure.
"It gives you the opportunity to run the football. I don't care how we score. I don't care what it looks like. I just want to win."
If the Mountaineers want to do that, too, at this crucial time of the football season, they're going to have to stuff something besides a turkey.
Contact Sports Editor Jack Bogaczyk at ja...@dailymail.com">ja...@dailymail.com or 304-348-7949.
http://dailymail.com/Sports/JackBogaczyk/200911160032
In finish, WVU needs to 'stuff it'
by Jack Bogaczyk
Daily Mail Sports Editor
CINCINNATI - In Bill Stewart's first season as West Virginia's football coach, the Mountaineers never played a ranked team - although the Mountaineers did squish No. 3 Oklahoma the previous January in his job-earning, Fiesta Bowl debut game.
This season, WVU hadn't played a ranked club until taking No. 5 Cincinnati to the limit in Friday's 24-21 setback at Nippert Stadium.
The road loss to the Bearcats (10-0, 6-0 Big East) changed the Mountaineer schedule's degree of difficulty significantly.
WVU's final two regular-season dates will (likely) be against poll-sitters.
Next up, in 11 days, is No. 8 Pitt (9-1, 5-0) at Mountaineer Field. Then it's off for a regular-season finale at Rutgers, which at No. 25 made the 2009 Associated Press poll for the first time Sunday.
After a 47-15 home embarrassment by Cincinnati in the season opener, the Scarlet Knights have reached an under-the-radar 7-2 (2-2). They are likely to be 9-2 when WVU (7-3, 3-2) arrives in New Jersey, because they visit Big East bottomed-out Syracuse and Louisville next.
(There's also the consideration that Rutgers pasted USF 31-0 last Thursday, and the Bulls have had their way with West Virginia - although few others of Big East quality - in recent years.)
So, with the winds and weather of late November and early December overdue, here's a message for Stewart's team:
Stuff it.
Through everything that played out Friday night at noisy Nippert - and it was only the fourth game in eight seasons in which West Virginia won the turnover battle (2-0) and lost - the Bearcats' ability to run through and around the WVU defense was the difference-maker.
UC sophomore Isaiah Pead made his second career start a memorable one, rushing for 175 yards. Since 2002, only two backs (2004, Leon Washington, Florida State, 195; and 2008, Sean McCoy, Pitt, 183) have run for more yards against WVU.
If West Virginia is going to play its way to success as the season winds down, it's going to have to stop the run. Pead's effort wasn't an aberration in recent history.
The previous week, Louisville's unheralded Darius Ashley ran for 164 yards against the WVU defense. The next challenge is Pitt freshman Dion Lewis, who leads Big East ground-gainers and had 152 yards in the Panthers' win over Notre Dame on Saturday.
Startling stat time:
In a 6-1 start, West Virginia allowed a total of only 604 rushing yards (86.3 per game). In going 1-2 since (losses to USF and Cincinnati sandwiching a ho-home home win over Louisville), WVU has permitted 606 ground yards (a 202-yard average).
"We weren't consistent in knocking down the run," WVU defensive coordinator Jeff Casteel said minutes after the loss at Cincinnati. "It was a problem all night. If you can't do that and do it well, it will end up coming back to haunt you.
"I thought overall our kids did a good job, but if had done better in the run phase ... We almost had them a couple more times. We just need to make a play when you've got to make them."
Casteel bemoaned Pead's 43-yard run on first-and-10 from the UC 24 with five minutes left that took Cincinnati, leading 21-14, to WVU's 33 and started the Bearcats toward their clinching field goal.
"We had a chance to make a play with 4-5 minutes left, and we couldn't get the guy on the ground," he said.
The WVU defense had taken done a really solid job taking away the Bearcats' major offensive weapons - receivers Mardy Gilyard and Armon Binns.
Cincinnati was averaging 325 yards per game through the air and 158 on the ground. Against WVU, the totals in those statistical lines, however, were 221 and 216.
"They're known as a passing team and that ran the ball, switched their game plan up," Mountaineer safety Robert Sands, who had his fourth interception of the season. "They ran it toward the weak side and got hat-on-hat on the weak side and found some open room.
"For the most part defensively, we did what we have to do. They live off big plays, and we gave up some big plays, but we also made some plays, too. Mostly, I thought, we played a good game ... "
The Bearcats, it seemed, took what the Mountaineers' 3-3-5 stack scheme gave them.
"Mardy Gilyard just had coverage all over him," said Cincinnati Coach Brian Kelly, who is 31-6 in three Bearcat seasons. "(WVU) doubled Binns. They can do it by virtue of their three-down (linemen) structure.
"It gives you the opportunity to run the football. I don't care how we score. I don't care what it looks like. I just want to win."
If the Mountaineers want to do that, too, at this crucial time of the football season, they're going to have to stuff something besides a turkey.
Contact Sports Editor Jack Bogaczyk at ja...@dailymail.com">ja...@dailymail.com or 304-348-7949.
http://dailymail.com/Sports/JackBogaczyk/200911160032