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Two Ranked Teams to Battle Saturday in Norman
September 30, 2015 12:03 PM | Football
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - A battle of two nationally ranked teams will take place this Saturday when No. 23 West Virginia travels to Norman, Oklahoma, to face the 15th-ranked Sooners at Gaylord Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium.
West Virginia, off to a 3-0 start with impressive blowout victories over Georgia Southern, Liberty and Maryland, will get a better gauge on where it’s at this weekend against an Oklahoma team that shows wins over Akron, Tennessee and Tulsa.
The Sooners needed two overtimes to defeat Tennessee, 31-24, in Knoxville 18 days ago after Oklahoma fell behind 17-0 in the second quarter.
Junior quarterback Baker Mayfield keyed Oklahoma’s comeback victory by throwing two fourth-quarter touchdown passes and then accounting for two more scores in overtime, one himself, in what Sooner fans hope was a coming-of-age performance.
“He is fun to watch,” said West Virginia coach Dana Holgorsen. “He keeps (plays) alive as good as anyone in the country. He has a talented, live arm and he can also run the ball, so it starts with him.”
Mayfield is a former Texas Tech transfer who walked on at Oklahoma and beat out last year’s starter, Trevor Knight, during the preseason. He’s has made consistent improvement each week operating first-year offensive coordinator Lincoln Riley’s passing-oriented attack.
He passed for 383 yards and three touchdowns in the opener against Akron, threw for 187 yards and three scores in the Tennessee victory, and then two weeks ago, threw for 487 yards and four scores in a wild, 52-38 win over Tulsa.
Mayfield’s 572 yards of total offense against Tulsa were a school record and helped him earn several national honors.
“It’s still way early and we’ve been inconsistent overall, but I do believe in what Lincoln’s doing and I believe our players will continue to improve and get better at it as we go,” said Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops, now 171-44 in his 17th season in Norman.
The Sooners piled up 773 yards against the Golden Hurricane and they needed every single one of them in a game that featured a 12 touchdowns and 1,376 total yards – second only to the 1,440 yards Oklahoma and West Virginia produced in an equally wild and wooly affair in Morgantown three years ago.
West Virginia fans have become well-acquainted with senior wide receiver Sterling Shepard and sophomore running back Samaje Perine, each of whom had big games against the Mountaineers last year in Morgantown.
Shepard caught six passes for 101 yards and Perine ran 34 times for 242 yards and four touchdowns in Oklahoma’s 12-point win last season. The Sooners chose to go big against the Mountaineer defense in that game and caught them off guard with some unbalanced sets that helped spring Perine to his impressive night.
Oklahoma Statistical Leaders
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#6 Baker Mayfield 6-1 | 209 | Jr. | QB Passing: 74-of-110, 1,062 Yards, 10 TDs, 2 INTs |
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#32 Samaje Perine 5-10 | 230 | So. | RB Rushing: 56 Att., 263 Yards, 4.7 Avg., 2 TDs |
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#3 Sterling Shepard 5-10 | 193 | Sr. | WR Receiving: 18 Rec., 286 Yards, 15.9 Avg., 2 TDs |
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#1 Dominique Alexander 6-0 | 220 | Jr. | LB Tackles: 32 Total, 15 Solo |
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#97 Charles Walker 6-2 | 297 | So. | DT Tackles for Loss: 3.5 Total, 1.5 Sacks |
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#15 Zack Sanchez 5-11 | 179 | Jr. | CB Interceptions: 1, 2 Pass Breakups |
“It was the difference in the game,” Holgorsen said of Perine’s performance last season in Morgantown.
So far this season, Perine is still getting his bearings in Riley’s throw-first, run-second offensive attack, although he did rush for a season-high 152 yards two weeks ago against Tulsa.
In that Tulsa game, the Golden Hurricanes had an eye-opening 603 yards against an Oklahoma defense that is returning several key players from last year’s unit that ranked fourth nationally by allowing just 3.02 yards per rush.
Tulsa was able to get 176 yards on the ground against the Sooners (on 40 attempts), while also completing 34-of-51 passes for 427 yards and four touchdowns.
However, Tennessee and Akron had much greater difficulty moving the ball against the Sooners, Akron finishing with only 10 first downs and 226 total yards and Tennessee, after an impressive first half, got almost nothing in the second half and finished just 254 yards on 76 plays.
Which Sooner defense will West Virginia see on Saturday? Holgorsen believes it will be the one that he watched on tape in the second half against Tennessee.
“It was two different defenses that you watched against Tennessee and what you saw against Tulsa,” said Holgorsen. “I think everybody would rather have Tennessee’s guys than Tulsa’s guys and Tennessee has been recruiting at such a high level for the last three or four years. They had a lot of players running around out there and Oklahoma shut them down.”
Oklahoma has two experienced inside linebackers in Dominique Alexander and Jordan Evans and a tremendous pair of edge rushers in seniors Eric Striker and Devante Bond.
Striker had a big game against West Virginia last year with eight tackles, a sack, two tackles for losses and a pass breakup and he will be a handful on the edge for redshirt freshman left tackle Yodny Cajuste. Striker holds the OU record for career sacks by a linebacker with 16 and he will require some extra attention in obvious passing situations.
Senior defensive end Charles Tapper is another player who will require special attention with 96 tackles, 17½ tackles for losses, 8½ sacks and two forced fumbles in 34 career games heading into Saturday.
Junior corner Zack Sanchez, a three-year starter, headlines a Sooner secondary that also includes a couple of sophomores in Jordan Thomas and Steven Parker. Sanchez had six tackles, one TFL, a quarterback hurry and the game-preserving interception against the Vols to earn Big 12 Defensive Player of the Week honors.
Sanchez had six tackles and a pick in last year’s game against West Virginia.
“It’s the same type of scheme that they used against us last year, and they have almost the same players that they had against us last year,” said Holgorsen. “We know we have our work cut out for us. They are big. They are physical and they want to stop the run. They have no problem playing man coverage with the talented athletes that they have on the back end.”
The Mountaineers, meanwhile, are coming off an impressive 45-6 win over border rival Maryland last Saturday. West Virginia scored touchdowns the first three times it had the football and rolled to an easy win over the Terps.
Quarterback Skyler Howard had another impressive performance by completing 21 of his 33 pass attempts for 294 yards and four touchdowns against the Terps before giving way to backup William Crest Jr. early in the fourth quarter.
In three games this season Howard is completing 69 percent of his pass attempts for 916 yards and nine touchdowns with only one interception.
Statistical Comparison
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Sophomore Shelton Gibson is developing into Howard’s preferred target, the Cleveland resident catching 12 passes for 329 yards and four touchdowns, including a pair of scores in last Saturday’s Maryland game.
Junior Daikiel Shorts Jr. and Jovon Durante have 11 catches apiece for a combined 365 yards and three touchdowns.
Junior Wendell Smallwood leads a Mountaineer ground game that is averaging 220.3 yards per game and 4.6 yards per carry with 331 yards and four touchdowns. He is coming off a career-high, 147-yard performance against the Terps last Saturday.
Rushel Shell is West Virginia’s second-leading rusher with 146 yards on 34 totes.
“West Virginia has always been very purposeful in running the football and we’ve got to be great against the run, but still be great covering people and getting pressure as well,” said Stoops.
West Virginia’s defense has been one of the nation’s stingiest through the first three games, allowing just 307.3 yards and 7.7 points per game. Opponents have yet to score in the first half against the Mountaineers and have turned the ball over 11 times in three games.
West Virginia fans are curious to see how the Big 12’s No. 1-ranked defense in points allowed, passing, turnover margin, interceptions, pass efficiency, third down conversions and red zone scoring will perform on Saturday against the Sooners.
“They play really well; very physical; they play hard; got a lot of speed out there and they try and pressure you,” noted Stoops. “They’ve done an excellent job up to this point.”
Oklahoma has won all three meetings with West Virginia since the Mountaineers joined the Big 12 in 2012 by an average margin of 7.3 points per game. The Sooners are an impressive 92-8 in Norman under coach Bob Stoops and 16-4 versus AP-ranked teams at Memorial Stadium.
Oklahoma is also 13-2 under Stoops in games following a bye week.
“They are the first of nine challenging Big 12 football games and we will take it one game at a time,” explained Holgorsen. “It’s the first road trip of the season and we know what we’re getting into. We have a bunch of guys on our team that have been to Norman. They were on this same trip two years ago (16-7 loss) and they played against the Sooners for the last three years; they have familiarity with who they are, their personnel and what their stadium looks like.”
West Virginia’s only victory at Oklahoma came in the 1982 when Hall of Fame coach Don Nehlen defeated another hall of famer, Barry Switzer, 41-27, in the season opener that season.
Saturday’s game will kick off at noon and will be televised nationally on Fox Sports 1.
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