MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - There are lots of reasons why West Virginia’s defense has performed so well in recent victories against Kansas State, Texas Tech and TCU.

 

First of all, these guys have been playing together now in the same scheme for three straight years, so they know what they are doing.

 

Defensive coordinator Tony Gibson does an amazing job of getting his guys to play hard all of the time and making sure they are in the right spots to make plays.

 

Those big guys up front - Christian Brown, Darrien Howard and Noble Nwachukwu - are really coming into their own and have to be considered one of the more underrated fronts in the nation. What Bruce Tall does with those guys on a daily basis is also one of the more underappreciated aspects of this football team, at least to outsiders.

 

The scheme, too, makes things difficult because those second-level guys all look alike, regardless of whether they are playing outside linebacker, safety or even corner.

 

Hybrid linebackers Justin Arndt and David Long are like extra safeties out there running around, but yet they are stout enough at the point of attack to hold up in the run game. Even middle linebacker Al-Rasheed Benton is athletic enough to drop back into pass coverage and intercept passes when the situation requires it.

 

For an offensive lineman or a quarterback trying to call out protections, it’s got to look like there are 13 or 14 players running around out there at times.

 

Many of these things are pretty clear to the naked eye.

 

But what may not be so clear to the naked eye is the important role the offense has played in the success of this year’s defense - and to the overall success of the football team this season.

 

Think back to last year’s TCU game in Fort Worth the way the offense was unable to handle the final 1:01 of the first half when the game was still at a manageable stage.

 

West Virginia, backed up to its own nine after a holding penalty on a kickoff return, got right into scoring mode, threw two incomplete passes and punted the ball from its own end zone back to TCU at midfield with 21 seconds still left on the clock.

 

TCU was able to make a couple first downs and get into range for Jaden Oberkrom to kick a 57-yard field goal right before halftime. That sequence completely changed the outlook of the game, and when TCU came out and scored on its opening possession of the third quarter, the ballgame was over.

 

Now hit the fast-forward button to West Virginia's impressive 34-10 victory over the Horned Frogs yesterday to improve to 6-0. WVU jumped out to an early 14-0 lead, withstood TCU’s 10-point flurry and finished the half leading 21-10.

 

Then, in the third quarter, the offense came out and completely hogged the football. West Virginia drove from its 25 to the TCU 21, and although the Mountaineers only got a field goal out of the drive, they milked 7:44 off the clock and assumed complete control of the game.

 

TCU had one offensive possession in the third quarter and ran a total of 22 plays in the second half - 10 of those coming on a meaningless final drive with 2:23 left on the clock. That’s just 12 plays to defend in 28 minutes of game action! It’s pretty hard to score points when you don’t have the football.

 

Even the Mountaineer players are beginning to realize the value of hogging the football.

 

“I was telling Skyler, ‘Man, we’ve got to run some of this clock down and control the game and help our defense out,’” said senior running back Rushel Shell, who had perhaps his finest game in a Mountaineer uniform by rushing for 117 yards against TCU’s always-stout defense. “They bailed us out early and got the ball back to us so it was our time to step up and give them a chance to sit down, regroup and get everything together. That’s just controlling the game by moving the ball.”

 

Indeed, players, schemes and coaching are all important to playing successful defensive football, but when your guys only have to defend 22 second-half plays, that’s the best defense of all.

 

And, the offense did it the old-fashioned way - I-formation, 21-personnel, bloody knuckles, take-your-lunchbox-to-work, smash-mouth football - which is exactly what TCU wanted to come in and do to West Virginia.

 

Remember, that is what Oklahoma and Kansas State have done so successfully in the past against WVU.

 

“We feel comfortable with our running game,” said Shell. “We trust our guys up front. We feel like we have a special unit up there and (fullback) Elijah Wellman is just a dog who is going to put his head in there no matter what. Something we talk about is getting our knuckles bloody and being blue collar.”

 

“Coach (Don) Nehlen is somewhere smiling right now,” added running backs coach Ja’Juan Seider.

 

He sure is.

 

This is his kind of football - football that still works. Just ask Nick Saban.

 

Saban will let Lane Kiffin mix mustard and ketchup together to make his fancy sauce, but when he needs to rein things in and run the ball Saban will do so at a drop of a hat.

 

“I think you are just seeing us evolve,” said Seider. “Every week it’s something different. We can be wide-open, empty, stack-outside to old-school football with 21-personnel. That’s when you know you are starting to evolve as an offense.”

 

The evolution really began after the loss at TCU last year when the Mountaineers ran the ball 57 times for 300 yards in a 31-26 victory over Texas Tech. It continued with a 51-carry, 257-yard rushing performance against Texas and then a 55-carry, 426-yard rushing effort at Kansas.

 

With the exception of the Arizona State game in the Cactus Bowl when the Sun Devils dared West Virginia to throw the ball on nearly every play, the Mountaineers have run the football at least 35 times in their last 12 games dating back to last season, 11 of those wins, by the way.

 

This year, the ground game churned out 241 yards in the opener against Missouri, 235 yards against Youngstown State, 332 yards two weeks ago at Texas Tech and those all-important 158 yards through the briar patch against an excellent TCU defense.

 

The run-pass ratio for Dana Holgorsen’s “Air Raid” attack during this most recent 12-game stretch is 541-392 - in favor of the run, an average of 45.1 rushing attempts and 228.8 yards per game.

 

“I feel like when we are keeping the ball and moving it down the field it messes with (the other team),” said Shell. “Coach Seider told us all week the game was going to be determined in our room by how we performed and when we play well you can’t guard our wide receivers one on one. Our offense is at its full potential when we are able to run the ball.”

 

The defense is at its full potential when the offense runs the ball, too.

 

Here is another way to look at it: you can call plays to score points, or, you can call plays to win football games. West Virginia is obviously calling plays to win football games.

 

Therefore, it shouldn’t come as a complete surprise why Tony Gibson’s defense has been able to hold down some really good offenses the last few weeks.

 

It’s hard to score points when you don’t have the football.

 

And Gibson will be the first guy to admit that.