Texas Notebook
November 09, 2014 11:27 AM | General
AUSTIN, Texas - I’m all for giving the other team credit when credit is due – something that is seemingly becoming much harder for some people to do these days for some reason – but Saturday’s loss to Texas was more about what West Virginia didn’t do than what Texas did.
A Longhorn offense that couldn’t score against Kansas State (West Virginia’s next opponent on November 20), that scored just seven points in blowout losses to BYU and Baylor, and a Longhorn offense that has struggled all season to come up with big plays from scrimmage, rolled up 24 points in the first half against a West Virginia defense that has played so well this year against offenses much more dynamic than the one it faced on Saturday afternoon in Austin.
As for the Mountaineer offense, which came into Saturday’s game ranked 11th in passing, 12th in total offense and 22nd in scoring, three points was all it had to show for a first half that saw a false start during a fourth-and-goal play turn seven points into three, a missed field goal wipe three more points off the scoreboard and a running game that produced 417 yards in their last two games against Oklahoma State and TCU manage just 42 by halftime.
“The first half was a good, old-fashioned butt kicking,” said West Virginia coach Dana Holgorsen. “That’s what it was on all three sides of the ball. We got outcoached; got outplayed. Whether it was a little bit of a hangover, so to speak, from last week I don’t know, but we weren’t ready to play. I take responsibility for that.”
Texas did very little in the second half because it couldn’t. All nine of the Longhorns’ remaining points were on West Virginia – Cedric Reed’s sack of Clint Trickett in the end zone for a safety and Johnathan Gray’s 15-yard touchdown run late in the game when the Mountaineers turned the ball over on downs at their own 15-yard line.
“We have to give our guys a little bit of credit for at least going out there in the second half and competing,” said Holgorsen. “I don’t think we competed very hard in the first half, but at least we did in the second half.”
Briefly:
* Holgorsen said his team got a little first-half lesson in Football 101 on Saturday against the Longhorns. “In the first half they blocked better, they ran the ball between the tackles and we couldn’t run very well; we couldn’t run between the tackles,” he said. “Everything happens up front. I don’t think our offensive line did very good and that’s where you get exposed. Our defensive front didn’t do a very good job in the first half. They really responded in the second half and our offensive line responded in the second half running the ball a little bit better.”
* West Virginia had difficulty all afternoon blocking Reed, who sacked Trickett three times and was responsible for four of the Longhorns’ eight negative yardage plays for afternoon. Reed’s sack and safety early in the fourth quarter was a big blow to West Virginia’s comeback hopes after the Mountaineers had worked hard to get it back to a two-possession game.
“Our tackles get in a bind every now and again and we don’t want to put them in the situations where obviously they know we’re throwing it and they’re going to be able to get a good pass rush,” said offensive coordinator Shannon Dawson. “We tried to stay out of those situations as much as we can, but when you’re down 21 points you got to be able to throw the football. At times, our protection was good but it broke down a couple of times in critical situations and it hurt us.”
* Defensive coordinator Tony Gibson was equally disappointed in his unit’s performance, from allowing 178 yards rushing in the first half to seeing quarterback Tyrone Swoopes complete almost 60 percent of his first-half throws.
In the second half, Swoopes hit on just 3 of 15 pass attempts and was chucking them all over the place, including into the arms (and sometimes out of the arms) of the guys wearing the white jerseys.
And those Texas running backs? The guys who spent the first half gouging West Virginia’s defense between the tackles? They had just 47 yards after the break.
“We decided to play in the second half, that’s the bottom line,” said Gibson. “It’s our fault as coaches. I’ll take full responsibility for the defense. In the first half, we came out sluggish and couldn’t stop the run. They controlled the line of scrimmage and did what they wanted to do.
“It wasn’t a big secret what they were going to do,” Gibson continued. “They were going to get in double tight end sets, they got big backs, and they were going to try and pound us and they did it. They controlled us up front. They ran through our linebackers and ran through our DBs, but again, that’s not on the kids, that’s on me.”
“You can’t win a football game like that,” added defensive tackle Kyle Rose. “You get down 24 points in the first half. The defense fought hard in the second half but we made too many mistakes in the first half. We just weren’t … whatever happened, I’m not really sure yet. I haven’t watched the film.”
When the players do watch the film later today, I have a feeling they are going to realize that they left one out out there on Saturday.
Now, the Mountaineers have nine days to get ready for a Thursday night game against a Kansas State team that beat them by 23 points last year in Manhattan and by 41 points in Morgantown two years ago.
“We still have a lot to prove,” said wide receiver Jordan Thompson. “Coming off back-to-back losses people are like ‘maybe it’s going to be a .500, 6-6 season.’ It’s not going to be a 6-6 season. We’re going to come out, prove everyone wrong, and try to reach our ultimate goal – to reach a good bowl game. You never know what’s going to happen in this type of league, so we just got to keep playing hard.”
* Of note … West Virginia wide receiver Kevin White set a school record with 16 receptions on Saturday after being held to six catches for 57 yards over his prior two games against Oklahoma State and TCU.
For the season, the senior now shows 91 catches for 1,207 yards and eight touchdowns with two regular season games and a bowl game remaining.
Sophomore Wendell Smallwood has now assumed the team lead in rushing with 585 yards. Rushel Shell is second with 560 yards while senior Dreamius Smith is now third with 411 yards.
Smith came into the game in the second half and gave the offense a big lift with a 9-yard touchdown run and then a 62-yard jaunt that set up the Mountaineers’ other second-half TD in the fourth quarter. West Virginia's three longest running plays from scrimmage this season have come from Smith in the last three weeks, including a 50-yarder last week against TCU and a 40-yarder two weeks ago at Oklahoma State.
And senior Clint Trickett, with his 248 yards passing on Saturday, became just the third quarterback in school history to pass for more than 3,000 yards in a season (he now has 3,173).
The other two are Geno Smith and Marc Bulger.
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