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Mountaineers, Longhorns to Meet Saturday
November 11, 2015 01:59 PM | Football
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - West Virginia got some of its mojo back following last Saturday’s 31-26 win over Texas Tech at Milan Puskar Stadium, and now the Mountaineers hope to get a little more of it back this Saturday against Texas.
The Longhorns (4-5) have been up and down this year, playing terrific in their Red River Rivalry game against Oklahoma, playing well in their 23-9 home victory against Kansas State and tight losses to Cal and Oklahoma State, and playing poorly in blowout defeats to Notre Dame and Iowa State.
Most recently, Texas throttled Kansas, 59-20, in Austin last Saturday.
In that game, the Longhorns put 598 yards on the stat sheet and 59 points on the scoreboard – the most points a Texas offense has scored in 33 games dating back to Mack Brown’s coaching tenure in 2013.
Before facing the Jayhawks, Texas was having trouble consistently generating explosive plays from scrimmage. The Longhorns were averaging a little more than five yards per play and 329.8 yards per game heading into the Kansas game, and coming out of it, those numbers improved to 359.6 yards per game and 5.6 yards per play.
Statistical Comparison
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Texas had 10 plays of 20 yards or longer from scrimmage against KU, including D’Onta Foreman’s 93-yard touchdown run, John Burt’s 84-yard touchdown reception from Jerrod Heard and quarterback Tyrone Swoopes’ 44-yard run.
More to the point, 54 of Texas’ 64 explosive plays from scrimmage have come at Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium. The Longhorns are averaging 437.6 yards per game and 6.9 yards per play at home and just 262 yards per game and 4.0 yards per play on the road.
Of course, Saturday’s game is in Morgantown.
“They have played a tough schedule, just as we have, and they’ve lost some close games,” said West Virginia coach Dana Holgorsen.
Coach Charlie Strong has 25 underclassmen on his offensive two-deep and he’s using all of them, including two quarterbacks in redshirt freshman Jerrod Heard and junior Tyrone Swoopes.
Mountaineer fans are familiar with Swoopes, who was under center for last year’s 33-16 Longhorn victory in Austin. Texas used a power run game and a stifling defense to build a 24-3 halftime lead over the 24th-ranked Mountaineers.
West Virginia finished that evening with 448 yards of total offense, but those numbers were deceiving because 356 of them came in the second half when the Longhorns were protecting their three-touchdown advantage.
This Saturday, West Virginia expects to see a lot of 11-personnel from the Longhorns with tight end Andrew Beck being utilized as their second wide receiver in a lot of sets. That means a healthy dose of runs from 211-pound senior tailback Johnathan Gray, 241-pound sophomore tailback D’Onta Foreman, quarterbacks Heard and Swoopes, and play-action passes down the field to Burt, Daje Johnson and Armanti Foreman.
Heard is the team’s leading ground gainer with 540 yards (714 before losses), while Foreman shows 534 yards and four touchdowns while averaging 6.9 yards per tote.
“They are going to run it all over the place, and we have to be physical and stop the run,” noted Holgorsen.
Burt is Texas’ biggest weapon in the passing game with 19 catches for 376 yards and two touchdowns – the one going for 84 yards last weekend against Kansas being Texas’ longest pass play from scrimmage this season.
Heard and Swoopes have combined to complete 55.6 percent of their pass attempts for 1,374 yards and seven touchdowns with just three interceptions.
“Their starting lineup has been all over the place,” said Holgorsen. “Offensively, they have a lot of different bodies in and out of the game. I think they made a decision that they are going to play a lot of different people to try and figure out who are going to be their dudes for the future.”
Defensively, Texas has been pretty sound most of the year with the exceptions being the 38 points Notre Dame scored on the Longhorns in the opener, the 45 points Texas gave up to Cal in week three and the 50 points TCU scored two weeks later.
Strong’s defenses are known for bringing lots of pressure and disguising their blitzes well. Teams have moved the ball on them this year, averaging 434.2 yards per game and 5.4 yards per play, but the Longhorns have been pretty good at generating negative yardage plays (60 for minus 279 yards).
Texas ranks sixth in the country this week in sacks with an average of 3.3 per game. Fourteen different Longhorn defenders have gotten to opposing quarterbacks, including eight players with multiple sacks.
Strongside linebacker Peter Jinkens leads Texas with 5 ½ sacks and 8 ½ tackles for losses.
Texas Statistical Leaders
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#13 Jerrod Heard 6-2 | 195 | Fr. | QB Passing: 79-of-134, 1,040 Yards, 4 TDs, 3 INTs |
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#33 D'Onta Foreman 6-0 | 241 | So. | RB Rushing: 77 Att., 534 Yards, 6.9 Avg., 4 TDs |
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#1 John Burt 6-2 | 184 | Fr. | WR Receiving: 19 Rec., 376 Yards, 19.8 Avg., 2 TDs |
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#19 Peter Jinkens 6-0 | 230 | Sr. | LB Tackles: 67 Total, 41 Solo |
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#46 Malik Jefferson 6-3 | 232 | Fr. | LB Tackles for Loss: 6.0 Total, 2.5 Sacks |
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#14 Dylan Haines 6-1 | 193 | Jr. | S Interceptions: 4, 3 Pass Breakups |
And just as he’s doing on offense, Strong’s two-deep on defense is littered with underclassmen, including 21 freshmen and sophomores. This is the same thing he once did at Louisville that eventually resulted in a Sugar Bowl victory over Florida in 2013.
“I think they are playing great on defense, I really do,” said Holgorsen. “I thought they were potentially the best defense we faced last year. They had four or five guys that were on last year’s team that are in the NFL. You look at them and you can say how they have been up and down as a team, but defensively I don’t see that. I see a bunch of guys who are playing hard on defense.”
Texas fans are hopeful Strong has the Longhorns headed down a similar path because his 10-12 record since taking over for Mack Brown is not what they signed up for.
He needs to win two of his last three games against West Virginia, Texas Tech and Baylor to get the Longhorns bowl eligible in 2015.
West Virginia, at 4-4, 1-4, is also looking to finish the season on a strong note with remaining games against Texas, Kansas, Iowa State and Kansas State.
Saturday’s game will kick off at noon and will be televised nationally on ESPNU.
“I am looking forward to playing at home again and feeding off of the positive energy that Mountaineer Field holds and what the fan base brings,” said Holgorsen. “What our fans do affects our players positively and negatively.
“We need everyone to come out and be ready to cheer loud – we want them to make it a great Big 12 environment on Saturday,” added Holgorsen.
There are tickets remaining for Saturday's "True Blue" game and they can be purchased through the Mountaineer Ticket Office by calling 1-800-WVU GAME or by logging on to WVUGAME.com.
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