Vote for Steve Slaton
September 24, 2008 02:13 PM | General
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| Steve Slaton |
Steve Slaton helped West Virginia to a pair of BCS bowl victories and a win over Georgia Tech in the 2007 Toyota Gator Bowl. Now, Mountaineer fans can help Steve win the Diet Pepsi NFL Rookie of the Week award.
Slaton rushed for 116 yards and scored a touchdown in Houston’s loss to Tennessee last weekend. Slaton is one of five candidates for this week’s award along with Baltimore’s Joe Flacco, Dallas’ Felix Jones, Miami’s Phillip Merling and Atlanta’s Matt Ryan.
To cast your vote for Steve log onto http://www.nfl.com/rookies.
You can vote until Friday at Noon.
When all else fails blame the quarterback. That is what is happening in St. Louis right now. The Rams have benched starter Marc Bulger in favor of Trent Green, who has previous experience operating the offense Al Saunders is now running in St. Louis.
It is Green who this weekend gets to step under center and drop back to pass behind the worst offensive line in the NFL. I’m sure the 38-year-old Green will be deep in thought during his drive to the stadium Sunday morning wondering what kind of mess he has gotten himself into.
And now from one former Mountaineer in the pro ranks to another … women’s soccer’s Kim Bonilla is currently playing professionally in Sweden for Pitea IF, which is first place in its division. The Dumfries, Va., native was a two-time all-Big East forward for the Mountaineers who wrapped up her career in 2007.
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| Jarrett Brown |
Bill Stewart reiterated this week that backup quarterback Jarrett Brown is going to play some this week against Marshall. Where he will line up is anyone’s guess.
“We wanted to play him last week,” Stewart said yesterday. “We don’t know if he’s going to play quarterback or where he is going to play but he’s going to play. I’ve talked to both he and the staff about him playing I back. Putting that big rascal back there might be advantageous to us.”
Stewart also mentioned that the offensive coaches need to be more creative with the personnel they have to overcome the team’s difficulties in third down situations, specifically third and short situations.
Jarrett Brown’s size and athletic ability may be of some help on third and short.
“When I run, I run and when I throw, I throw and I think I have the ability to do both,” Brown said. “I can catch, too. I play catch with Pat (White) every day.”
Brown said the last time he took a handoff and ran the football was when he was about 10 years old.
“I was pretty big for my age and I used to run the ball,” Brown said. “I wore my Emmitt Smith jersey - I had a No. 22 shirt that I always wore under my jersey and my number was 22. Smith was my guy.”
Jarrett Brown doesn’t have to be Emmitt Smith, Robert Smith or even Onterrio Smith with the football on Saturday against Marshall - just as long as he’s not Jaclyn Smith.
Senior defensive back Ellis Lankster says the team has tried to ignore the discontent some upset fans are feeling following a pair of road losses at East Carolina and Colorado. Mountaineer supporters have not been accustomed to witnessing two-game losing streaks. The last one came four years ago in 2004.
“We are going to respond to it and get our fans back and make them happy,” Lankster said.
Junior safety Quinton Andrews took a different slant.
“There is always going to be pressure and me being the person that I am, I want to do my best so Coach Stew can look really good because I know he’s trying his best,” Andrews said. “The whole team feels the same thing.”
I got a look at the plans for the new basketball practice facility and I’m telling you, it will be the nicest thing ever constructed for athletics. The plans are just immaculate.
As of noon on Wednesday, no decision has been made yet on whether or not the Marshall game will be carried on ESPN Game Plan.
Fans with ESPN360.com will be able to watch the game.
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| Dave Johnson |
Earlier this week in Tony Caridi’s blog he wrote about the unique perspective Steve Dunlap has being one year removed from standing on Marshall’s sidelines and coordinating the Thundering Herd defense.
What Caridi failed to mention was that West Virginia has two other assistant coaches with Marshall ties: head coach Bill Stewart and offensive line coach Dave Johnson.
Stewart was a 28-year-old offensive line coach on Sonny Randle’s staff in 1980 and Johnson spent four years with Marshall from 1997-2000 on Bob Pruett’s staff.
“I will always have a special place in my heart for Huntington, West Virginia, and for Marshall University,” Stewart said Tuesday.
He was also quick to add that he will suppress those feelings this weekend.
“I can’t wait to whip them and punch them right in the nose,” he joked. “That’s what you do with family – sometimes you have to hit family just as much as anyone else.”
Our lunchtime office discussion included the topic of parity in college football. How many elite teams are there in college football this year? Four? Five?
After USC, Oklahoma, Florida and LSU I think you can take the rest of the top 25 and lump them together. And no, I’m not entirely sold on Georgia yet. We will know a lot more about the Bulldogs this Saturday when they take on No. 8 Alabama at home. For that matter, we will also learn a little more about the Crimson Tide as well.
Junior forward Da’Sean Butler admitted to me last week that it took him a while to get used to Coach Bob Huggins’ style of coaching.
“I was so stressed last year and I was saying to myself, ‘If he says another thing to me I’m going to just snap and walk off the court.’ But you’ve got to deal with it. It’s part of being a player,” Butler said. “He tells you something and you do it and if you don’t do it well enough you try to do it harder the next time and try and get it right.”
Butler said he will talk to the new players if they are willing to listen.
“You get to the thing where you want to help somebody out but then you don’t want to be the one to just tell them all the time because that gets annoying after a while,” Butler said. “When somebody keeps telling me things I’m like, ‘Alright I don’t want to hear it every minute.’ But you don’t want to be left out to dry either. I will try and tell them something and see if they do it and just back off. I will try and do a little of both.”
Have a great week!
