Who could forget the historical end to West Virginia’s season last year. The Mountaineers earned themselves a Big East regular season championship and a trip to the Orange Bowl. With the discussion of whether the Big East conference was worthy enough to receive an automatic berth to a BCS Bowl, the Mountaineers made sure to put that discussion to rest with a record-setting 70-33 victory over ACC Champion Clemson. The last thing you want after a game like that was for the season to end.
After the much-anticipated wait for Mountaineer fans, the football team finally got back to work this past week. With the official start of spring practice, the players and coaches see themselves in a different predicament than in the past. After a back-and-forth battle with the Big East, the two sides finally reached an agreement to allow West Virginia to join the Big 12 for the upcoming year.
The Big 12 is known for having their shootouts and having high-powered offenses, which will be the perfect fit for West Virginia. Last year the Mountaineers averaged 37.6 points per game last year. West Virginia will be returning many of their key playmakers. One thing the Mountaineers are going to need to compete with National Title contenders in the Big 12 is a lot of depth. One position the Mountaineers are not running low on is running back. “We have Shawne (Alston) and Buie, but the dark horse, the guy that has stepped up and has taken pressure off, is Ryan Clarke. Clarke is a kid that carried the ball a lot in the past, but he proved that he was a willing blocker and he bought into his role,” Running Backs Coach Robert Gillespie said. Besides the plethora of running back the Mountaineers will be throwing the oppositions way, they will also have to keep an eye on speedster Tavon Austin and quarterback Geno Smith.
The Mountaineers will be returning their top two wide receivers from the 2011 season in Austin and Stedman Bailey. Austin and Bailey both eclipsed the 1,000 yard marker last year. Even though both players will get their share of touches throughout the season, they have showed their rust in the first week of spring practice. “Up and down we haven’t been doing great. In my opinion we’ve dropped too many balls. I’ll give credit to the defense because they’re real aggressive, real aggressive at corner and making us work for releases. If I had to letter grade it, I would give it a C or C-, we can do better, a lot better,” Offensive Coordinator and Wide Receivers Coach Shannon Dawson said.
Last year the defense allowed 26.8 points per game against a Big East conference that was less than par. The team has made numerous changes to better prepare themselves for the Big 12 this season, including adding first year Defensive Coordinator Joe Deforest. Deforest has implemented a 3-4 defense that he believes will bode well for his players. “As a coaching staff we try to make it as easy as possible on them – transition-wise, we tried to rhyme some things, make sure they understand who was blitzing and who wasn’t, and they’ve run some of the coverage’s we’re going to run, so there was some carry over there. After six practices, I’d say the defense is a C, because we’re not even close yet – it’s an A for effort.”
The defense will be put to the test this year against the up-tempo high-powered offenses of the Big 12, but they can’t say they won’t be prepared. Every day in practice they will face the same type of offense that Coach Dana Holgorsen will run. First year Co-Defensive Coordinator Keith Patterson believes facing this offense every day will prepare them for the season. “It’s hard to go up against an up-tempo team, so when you can practice against it every day there’s no doubt that it’s an advantage. The whole problem when you play teams with a fast tempo is being able to get the call from the sidelines, and you basically end up playing by the seat of your pants, because you’re not thinking of what’s going to happen and that’s built into our system now.”
The coaches and players will get a mini break from each other with next week being spring break. The two sides will reunite after this week for three hard weeks of practice to prepare for the Blue-Gold game. The annual scrimmage will be held on April 21 at 5:30 p.m.
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