Football Notebook
September 10, 2006 11:32 AM | General
September 10, 2006
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – During the week leading up the Eastern Washington game Rich Rodriguez talked publicly about the unpredictability of college football and the dangers of taking an opponent lightly. Privately, he was hopeful that his team could get a big early lead so he could get his star players out of the game with a quick five-day turnaround coming up this Thursday night against rival Maryland.
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| Backup quarterback Jarrett Brown completed 11 of 15 passes for 129 yards and a touchdown against Eastern Washington on Saturday.
All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks |
Mission accomplished.
West Virginia scored the first three times it had the ball and that was enough to send standouts Patrick White and Steve Slaton to the showers. Slaton carried just eight times for 105 yards and a pair of touchdowns, while White completed all four of his pass attempts for 48 yards while also running twice for 22 yards.
“Pat was still a little bit sore all this week but when he was warming up he said he felt great but we didn’t do a whole lot with him,” Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez indicated that just about everybody that could have played against the Eagles wound up getting into the game.
“At the end it was really nice to reward a couple of the guys like (walk-on quarterback) Markell Harrison that’s been in our program for a few years to be able to get those guys in at the end of the game,” Rodriguez said. “The first half I was hoping to get a little bit more of a comfortable lead to play more guys and we were able to substitute a couple of guys for Steve and Pat but there were a couple of drives we weren’t real happy with defensively so those guys played a little bit more.”
Several veteran defensive players admitted there were still things to clean up on that side of the ball. Although Eastern Washington finished the game with just three points and 12 first downs, the Eagles managed a couple of long, sustained drives including a 15-play, 73-yard sortie that ended at the Mountaineer seven.
A surprisingly raucous crowd of 59,504 proved to be the stopper for the Eagles with Eastern Washington drawing two delay-of-game penalties at the WVU two because of the crowd noise.
“Our crowd was great today,” said Rodriguez. “To have 59,000 come out for a I-AA game and to be in it the way they were was tremendous.”
Rodriguez is hopeful of similar crowd support Thursday night when the Mountaineers face their first stern test of the year playing a 2-0 Maryland team on ESPN.
Briefly:
“That was the only injury that took somebody out of the game,” Rodriguez said.
With Williams out, most of the reps at cornerback went to Antonio Lewis and Vaughn Rivers. Rodriguez said he’s concerned about that spot and will take a closer look at freshmen Guesly Dervil and Franchot Allen in practice this week.
“We’ve got to find another corner or two that can go in there,” Rodriguez said. “Antonio Lewis was taking so many reps on defense and special teams.”
“I thought Jarrett played really well and he made great decisions … there was a mistake here and there but when he made a mistake he overcame it with his athleticism,” Rodriguez said. “He threw the ball well and he was seeing the field well. When he’s in the pocket he doesn’t panic – he will look around for the open receiver.”
Most of the yardage on Brown’s first scoring drive came through the air with the Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., resident completing passes of 6 and 17 yards to Brandon Myles, 11 yards to Darius Reynaud, 10 yards to Dorrell Jalloh and the five-yard TD strike to Myles in the back of the end zone. Brown was three-for-three on third downs during the drive.
“We’ve got to get another guy ready as much as we run Pat White and Jarrett has certainly shown some things the last couple of games,” Rodriguez said.
The coach wanted Nate Sowers to see more action but the Martinsburg native injured his hamstring.
“He had a bad hip coming in and then he tweaked his hamstring a little bit or we would have left him in for another series,” Rodriguez said.
Another drive in West Virginia territory was thwarted when Eastern Washington quarterback Matt Nichols tried to force a pass into double coverage that was picked off in the West Virginia end zone by safety Quinton Andrews and returned out to the 31. It was Andrews’ second interception of the season.
The Eagles held a 16:28 to 13:32 possession time advantage over the Mountaineers in the first half.
Wulff was blunt in his assessment of Saturday’s game against the No. 5-rated team in the country.
“This was a payday for our program,” he said. “The money helps with renovations in the locker room, videos and equipment. This will make a big difference and help us with recruiting.”
“There never will be a thought about scoring to impress a pollster or a perception outside our program,” he said. “We just try to score every time we’ve got the ball.”
The school record for the fewest carries to reach 100 yards was performed by wide receiver Danny Buggs against William & Mary in 1972. Buggs ran three times for 100 yards against the Tribe.
Fewest Carries to 100 Yards in WVU History
3 (100), Danny Buggs vs. William & Mary, 1972
4 (111), Danny Buggs vs. Richmond, 1973
4 (159), Danny Buggs vs. Syracuse, 1972
4 (110), Bobby Moss vs. Marquette, 1955
5 (134), Jimmy Walthall vs. Case, 1944
6 (129), Quincy Wilson vs. Rutgers, 2001
6 (126), Major Harris vs. Cincinnati, 1987
6 (112), Edwin Dugan vs. Waynesburg, 1952
6 (125), Sam Pinion vs. West Virginia Wesleyan, 1938
7 (102), Dwayne Woods vs. Boston College, 1975
7 (100), Artie Owens vs. Kentucky, 19974
7 (105), Pete Wood vs. William & Mary, 1971
7 (109), Mike Sherwood vs. Pitt, 1969
7 (108), Vic Rabbits vs. Marquette, 1955
8 (105), Steve Slaton vs. Eastern Washington, 2006
8 (111), Patrick White vs. Cincinnati, 2005
“Normally on Saturday night I would go home and just relax and watch some games and get up (Sunday) and watch the film, but we’ve got to get this game over with, get the film graded and get to work on Maryland,” Rodriguez said. “Everything has been expedited. We won’t be physical in practice this week because we’ve got to get the guys ready to roll on Thursday.”
