MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - Skyler Howard's seven-yard touchdown pass to Jovon Durante with 6:11 left in the fourth quarter capped a 14-point comeback to give West Virginia a 17-16 victory over Kansas State before 61,171 fans Saturday afternoon at Milan Puskar Stadium in Morgantown.

It was the Big 12 Conference opener for both teams.

"Obviously, I just couldn't be more proud of our team for having the courage to go out there and do that in the second half," West Virginia coach Dana Holgorsen said. "I felt like we were able to move the ball, but we just couldn't get points on the board for a number of reasons."

The Wildcats (2-2) jumped out to a 13-0 halftime lead, but West Virginia responded with two fourth-quarter touchdowns - Durante's and a one-yard run by Justin Crawford early in the period to reduce Kansas State's lead to 16-10.

Crawford's touchdown came after Josh Lambert finally got points on the scoreboard for WVU on its opening possession of the third quarter; Lambert had missed his first try of the year, a 30-yarder on WVU's initial offensive possession of the game.

Then, with 6:11 still showing on the clock when Durante finally put West Virginia in the lead, it was up to Tony Gibson's defense to preserve it.

After Byron Pringle returned Mike Molina's short kickoff 30 yards to the K-State 41, the Wildcats moved the ball to the WVU 38 on Pringle's third-and-eight catch for 19 yards.

Three consecutive Charles Jones runs moved the football to the WVU 30-yard line when Kansas State called its last timeout with 2:59 still to play. All six timeouts Kansas State called today came at the line of scrimmage with the offense on the field, and at least five of them appeared to be the result of some confusion from the Wildcats attempting to get the right play called.

When play resumed, two Jones runs lost two yards and two WVU timeouts stopped the clock with 2:16 remaining and Kansas State facing a third and 12 at the 26. Quarterback Jesse Ertz, with West Virginia linebacker Xavier Preston putting heavy pressure on him, was unable to complete his pass to Pringle, leaving Matthew McCrane with a challenging 43-yard field goal attempt to try and give Kansas State back the lead.

McCrane had made his prior three attempts from 37, 31 and 22 yards, but this one sailed wide left of the post, giving West Virginia the ball at its own 26 and enabling the Mountaineers to run out the clock.

At the game's outset, it was Kansas State's defense that reigned supreme. The Wildcats turned away the Mountaineer twice inside their 35 and held them scoreless in the first half at Milan Puskar Stadium for the first time since Louisville did it in 2005 (a game WVU also rallied to win).

It wasn't until West Virginia's fourth trip inside K-State's 35 that it finally scored points, and the next two occasions it got back there resulted in touchdowns.

"I probably got a little impatient in the second quarter and probably got away from the run a little bit too much," Holgorsen admitted. "We called just pure dropback passes probably a little too much, and they struggled with that. Our game plan was to be able to keep them off balance, to do things in the run game, play action and to do some motion and movements to be able to help out (the offensive line). We got back to that in the second half."

Shelton Gibson's amazing catch down the near sideline while Kansas State defender D.J. Reed was pulling off his helmet netted 52 yards - and probably should have had 15 additional yards tacked on to the end of the play - and then a Ka'Raun White seven-yard reception moved the ball to the Wildcat 10 as the third quarter ended.

On the opening play of the fourth quarter, Crawford pushed the pile nine yards closer to the goal line, and then two plays later, he walked into the end zone off left tackle for his second rushing touchdown of the season.

Following an exchange of possessions, the defense came up with a key three-and-out series when it held Ertz 10 yards in front of the sticks on third and 18.

A short Nick Walsh punt of only 31 yards gave West Virginia good field position at its 43 with 8:18 to go. From there, two Crawford runs, one for 21 yards, moved the football to the K-State 35, and then a 13-yard Howard screen pass to White got 13 more yards to the Wildcat 22.

Two plays later, and facing a third and eight, Howard found White for nine more yards to give West Virginia a new set of downs at the 11. Crawford rushed for four before Howard, flushed out of the pocket and rolling out to his right, hit Durante in the back corner of the end zone for a seven-yard touchdown.

"He made a play," Holgorsen said of his senior quarterback.

It was the sophomore's first touchdown catch of the season and his first since making a 24-yard scoring grab in last year's loss at Kansas State.

Kansas State's lone touchdown happened in the first quarter when Ertz scored from the two.

Ertz had a miserable day passing the football, completing just 10-of-30 for 166 yards with one interception. Kansas State also struggled to move the ball on the ground, the netting just 120 yards on 42 attempts.

West Virginia's defense was credited with three sacks and eight tackles for losses.

"We just played harder (in the second half)," Holgorsen noted. "The crowd got into it, juiced us up and we got some momentum."

Meanwhile, the Mountaineers got 298 yards passing from Howard - 104 of those going to Gibson on just three catches - and Crawford produced the second 100-yard game of the season, ending with 104 on 18 attempts.

Overall, the West Virginia offense put up 422 total yards against the nation's No. 1-ranked defense heading into this weekend.

"We went out there in the second half and we did enough in all three phases to be able to win by one," Holgorsen said. "It's a heck of a feeling - proud of the guys - and this team knows how to play together. Probably the thing I've figured out more than anything the last two weeks is it's a group that likes each other, plays hard for each other and knows how to play together."

The Mountaineers are now 4-0 for the first time since 2012 when they started the season 5-0 and rose to No. 5 in the polls before losing at Texas Tech, which, incidentally, is West Virginia's next opponent in two weeks.

The victory was also WVU's first against Kansas State since joining the Big 12 in 2012. K-State's margin of victory was progressively smaller each time it faced West Virginia before finally losing this afternoon in Morgantown.

Today's win should get West Virginia back into the top 25 after it had received votes in both polls this week.

Kansas State plays at Texas Tech next Saturday.