Best Game This Weekend?
September 16, 2009 04:56 PM | General
(4:56 pm)
Post your comments
Mr. College Football, Tony Barnhart, has the West Virginia-Auburn game No. 4 on his list of top five weekend story lines in today’s blog on AJC.
Wrote Barnhart: “Everybody is talking about Florida-Tennessee and Georgia-Arkansas. But the best game of the weekend has a chance to be West Virginia’s trip to Auburn. West Virginia will never be able to replace the great Pat White, but it has found a very good quarterback in Jarrett Brown, who threw four touchdown passes to beat East Carolina (35-20), the defending Conference USA champs. Auburn has re-energized its offense under Gus Malian with 86 points in two games.”
Weekly Word
Here is what Chizik had to say about Jeff Casteel’s 3-3 stack: “Let me tell you, they are excellent at their trade. They are really, really good at what they do in terms of three-down defense. And that’s why, if you look at them over the course of time, those guys know exactly where they are supposed to be. And they’ve got so much speed.
“You can tell they really built their defense around that speed, but there also is so much carry-over knowledge.”
 |
|
| Fan of the week |
A few years ago, West Virginia’s visit to Louisville was one of the highest-rated games in Thursday night history. Well, last Saturday West Virginians gave a big boost to ESPN’s burgeoning online creation ESPN360.com. The Mountaineers’ game against East Carolina on ESPN360.com was the most consumed college football game ever in terms of total hours viewed (whatever that means), according to ESPN.
 |
|
| Quarterback Jeff Hostetler led West Virginia to its finest road victory ever in Norman in 1982.
WVU Sports Communications photo |
1. Oklahoma, 1982: “Crossed them up with a draw play!” yelled Jack Fleming into his microphone when Curlin Beck ran 43 yards for a touchdown to seal West Virginia’s 42-27 victory over ninth-ranked Oklahoma in Norman to begin the 1982 season. That was the game Jeff Hostetler was introduced to the nation, passing for 321 yards and four touchdowns.
2. Syracuse, 1962: Syracuse was just two years removed from the national championship when West Virginia upset the Orange 17-6 at Archbold Stadium in 1962. It was the Mountaineers’ first road win ever at Syracuse, and it came after blowout losses to the Orange in 1959 and 1960. Halfback Tom Woodeshick played a great all-around game and was signed underneath the goal post by the Buffalo Bills right after the game. A couple of months later, Woodeshick also signed with the Philadelphia Eagles, making him one of the first double-signers in pro football history.
3. California, 1975: The Cal Bears were loaded on offense with running back Chuck Muncie, and wide receivers Steve Rivera and Wesley Walker. The play of the game was Mountaineer safety Tommy Pridemore chasing down Walker, who caught a halfback pass from Muncie and was running free to the end zone when the Mountaineers were leading just 14-10. Cal failed to score and West Virginia tacked on a pair of touchdowns for a memorable 28-10 victory.
4. Maryland, 1973: It was Jerry Claiborne’s second season at Maryland and he did the unthinkable: he punted to West Virginia’s Danny Buggs with 36 seconds left on the clock and the scored tied at 13. Buggs took the ball at his own 31, took a few steps to his left where six Terrapin defenders were ready to unload on him. Then he did a 180, found an alley to his right and ran up the far sideline, cutting across the field at the 20 before high-stepping it into the end zone for a 69-yard touchdown. How often is it that a game is decided in the waning seconds on a punt return?
5. Maryland, 1977: How did this happen? Maryland was coming off an 11-1 season and a narrow loss to Houston in the Cotton Bowl in 1976, and was ranked 11th in the country to begin the ’77 season. The Terps knocked off Clemson 21-14 in the ‘77 opener and were licking their chops when the West Virginia team bus pulled into College Park. Despite being heavy underdogs, the Mountaineers jumped out to a 24-0 halftime lead and then had to make a goal line stand and take a safety to hold on for a 24-16 victory.
Here are the others …
West Virginia at Penn State, Oct. 26, 1991 (96,445) – That was the game Penn State had to replace the Lion roar on the scoreboard public address system: Penn State 51, West Virginia 6.
West Virginia at Ohio State, Sept. 12, 1987 (88,272) – It was Major Harris’ second career start. He only completed four passes that afternoon and two of them were to Ohio State players: Ohio State 24, West Virginia 3.
West Virginia at Penn State, Oct. 22, 1983 (86,309) – West Virginia was actually the favored team, which makes Penn State students rushing the field and tearing down the goal posts somewhat understandable even though the Lions defeated the Mountaineers for like the 200th straight time: Penn State 41, West Virginia 23.
West Virginia at Penn State, Nov. 4, 1989 (85,911) – Since Penn State couldn’t tackle Major Harris, the Lion players decided to tackle the football. The strategy worked: Penn State 19, West Virginia 9.
West Virginia at Penn State, Oct. 26, 1985 (85,534) – The only thing I remember about this game was that it was on TV, and the majority of the TV sets in West Virginia were turned off by halftime: Penn State 27, West Virginia 0.
West Virginia at Penn State, Oct. 31, 1987 (85,108) – Major Harris scrambles left. Major Harris scrambles right. Major Harris scrambles left. Meanwhile, standing wide open down the field was fullback Craig Taylor, who hauled in Harris’ pass and stumbled down to the Penn State five. Unfortunately, not too far behind Taylor was West Virginia offensive guard John Stroia: Penn State 25, West Virginia 21.
West Virginia at Penn State, Oct. 24, 1981 (85,012) – Penn State was ranked No. 1 in the country and could afford to rest Curt Warner’s tender hammy. Next on the two-deep was John Williams, who ran for 140 yards and a touchdown: Penn State 30, West Virginia 7.
You can read more about it in today’s Charleston Daily Mail: http://www.dailymail.com/Sports/JackBogaczyk/200909160031
Wrote Winn: “The Mountaineers are in the loaded Anaheim Classic along with Texas A&M, Clemson, UCLA, Butler and Minnesota, plus have true road dates scheduled with Purdue (a top-10 team) on Jan. 1 and Cleveland State (last year's Horizon League tournament champ) on Dec. 19. Home games with Ole Miss on Dec. 23 and Ohio State on Jan. 23 are tough as well.”
You can read Luke’s column here: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/luke_winn/09/15/schedule/index.html?eref=T1
 |
|
| Keilen Dykes |
That now makes 12 former Mountaineers on NFL rosters this season.
Have a great week!
