West Virginia Game Notes | Kansas State Game Notes

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – I couldn’t help but think of West Virginia’s game-six opponent Kansas State while watching Tampa Bay Rays manager Kevin Cash inexplicably remove Blake Snell from the game in the sixth inning of Tuesday night’s World Series loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers.

In a nutshell, statistics compelled Cash to take his dominant pitcher out of the game.

So, how does this relate to WVU’s football game against 16th-ranked Kansas State Saturday at Milan Puskar Stadium?

Well, statistics don’t tell the full story of coach Chris Klieman’s 2020 Wildcat team.

Here is what they say.

This week, K-State ranks eighth in the Big 12 in rushing, averaging just 129.2 yards per game. The Wildcats are also eighth in rushing defense, surrendering 159 yards per contest.

Kansas State is ninth in pass defense, giving up 268.8 yards per contest, and ninth in total defense, allowing 427.8 yards per game.

Kansas State also ranks third in scoring offense, averaging 35.2 points per game, but even that is a little misleading because 28 of the 176 points it has scored so far are the result of interception or punt returns, which is clearly not “scoring offense.”

Of the 2,358 all-purpose yards Kansas State has accumulated, 520 have come by means other than throwing or running the football.

Take a look at the stat sheet after the Oklahoma game and you’d think the Sooners won the game fairly handily. 

They didn’t.

Texas Tech had a 471-to-404 advantage in total yardage, but Kansas State was 10 points better on the scoreboard.

K-State generated just 289 yards of total offense at TCU, yet somehow managed to get out of Fort Worth seven points better than the Horned Frogs on the scoreboard.

Kansas State won by 41 at home against rival Kansas last Saturday in the Little Apple, but 21 of those were scored on punt returns or interceptions.

In many respects, what Kansas State does best is capitalize on what the other team does poorly.

“They don’t do anything hardly ever to beat themselves,” West Virginia defensive line coach Jordan Lesley said. “If you have a weakness they usually find it.”

The Wildcats (4-1) are either first or tied for first in the Big 12 in turnover margin, interceptions, turnovers gained and fumbles recovered.

K-State is also tops in interception avoidance, punt returns, net punting and fourth down conversion percentage – categories the common football fan usually glosses over.

But not the coaches who study Kansas State on a weekly basis. They see beauty where others see only blah.

“To me, it’s complementary football,” West Virginia coach Neal Brown said earlier this week. “That’s what we’re trying to accomplish. We are quite a bit better, but we have not always played good complementary football this year.

“What I mean by that is the defense plays well and the offense plays off of it. You get a sudden-change opportunity when the defense takes it away and the offense scores,” Brown said. “It’s the same with special teams, and I think they play great complementary football. I think they create their own breaks – it’s not luck, happenstance or anything like that – they do this because they are fundamentally sound, they’re well coached and in a word, they compete.”

It sort of reminds you of all of those Penn State losses – many of which the stat sheet told a different tale.

The number Klieman values most is the one on the scoreboard next to his team. That’s why he’s won 81.5% of the football games he’s coached at North Dakota State and Kansas State.

But that doesn’t mean Klieman’s football team lacks dangerous football players. 

Far from it.

Freshman running back Deuce Vaughn is already drawing comparisons to former Wildcat and NFL star Darren Sproles because the two are roughly the same height (Vaughn is 5-foot-5 and Sproles is 5-foot-6), but to me, Vaughn runs more like Avon Cobourne did for the Mountaineers two decades ago.

He doesn’t appear to have that extra gear Steve Slaton once had in the open field, but Vaughn is plenty fast enough and is capable of breaking arm tackles when he gets out in the open, much like Cobourne.

And like Sproles, Vaughn is a big asset in the passing game where he’s averaging 27.7 yards per reception and has accounted for 669 yards from scrimmage so far this season.

He had 129 yards receiving in the Oklahoma victory and was also effective catching the ball out of the backfield in the wins over Texas Tech and Kansas.

“He’s an issue and we’re going to have to ID him wherever he is on the field,” Brown said.

“They do a really good job of getting him hid in the formation and then getting him the ball and trying to create matchup issues,” Lesley said. “They’ve done that in every game, and they’ll try and do it to us.”

“If you are going to line up against this running back and cover 53 yards of field left to right, good luck,” secondary coach Jahmile Addae added. “But if you know where your help is and you are able to help to that then you can cut that 53 yards into 20. Those are the types of things we have to be able to do as coaches for our players to minimize his ability for the explosive play.”

Vaughn has been security blanket for true freshman quarterback Will Howard, who was pressed into emergency action when senior Skylar Thompson was lost for the season with an “upper body” injury sustained against Texas Tech.

Howard became the first freshman quarterback in Kansas State history to win a road game at TCU three weeks ago, and he is coming off a season high 243-yard, two-touchdown passing performance against Kansas.

“(Howard) has made two or three difficult passes each game he’s played for explosive plays,” Brown said.

Howard’s other security blanket is 6-foot-4, 250-pound senior tight end Briley Moore, who caught a touchdown pass in the Kansas game and shows 102 career receptions for 1,350 yards and eight touchdowns.

Moore and Vaughn will require specific attention on Saturday.

West Virginia will also have to give specific notice to senior defensive end Wyatt Hubert, considered one of the top defensive ends in the Big 12 this year.

Hubert had a sack in last week’s win over Kansas and shows 14½ sacks and 25½ career tackles for losses. On the other side, the Wildcats have two more good ones in 6-foot-3, 244-pound Khalid Duke and 6-foot-4, 260-pound Bronson Massie.

Behind them, Kansas State plays a lot of zone coverage to take advantage of the pressure its defensive ends can generate on the quarterback.

“They’ve got a lot of eyes on the football,” Brown explained. “What happens is a lot of (the interceptions it gets) are forced interceptions because they do a great job of getting pressure on the quarterback with a four-man rush. 

“You either got to keep more guys in to protect to have a chance to throw the ball down the field, or you get your guys out and you’ve got those ends, or they run games to get one-on-one (blocking) situations and the quarterback is under pressure and throwing the ball quicker than he wants to and that’s causing those interceptions,” Brown added.

Then, if you hang onto the football and don’t turn it over but still have to punt, you are facing a K-State special teams unit that has blocked three punts and returned two more for touchdowns so far this year.

That has to be an area of concern for youthful West Virginia, which has muffed one punt on special teams, which led to Baylor scoring a game-tying touchdown and an offense that has had two fumbles returned for scores.

By the way, the stat sheet favored WVU in its two defeats this year. The Mountaineers had a 353-to-342 edge in total yardage at Oklahoma State, and a 438-to-348 advantage last Saturday at Texas Tech.

“They play extremely hard, they know where to line up, they know what their assignments are and they all converge to the ball in a hurry. What better compliment is that?” West Virginia offensive coordinator Gerad Parker said. 

Saturday’s game will kick off at noon and will be televised nationally on ESPN2 (Roy Philpott, Kelly Stouffer and Dr. Jerry Punch).

The Mountaineer Sports Network from Learfield IMG College radio coverage begins at 8:30 a.m. on stations throughout West Virginia and online via WVUsports.com and the popular mobile app WVU Gameday leading into regular network coverage with Tony Caridi, Dwight Wallace and Jed Drenning at 11 a.m.

Tickets are still available for Saturday’s game and can be purchased by logging on to WVUGAME.com or by calling the Mountaineer Ticket Office toll-free at 1-800-WVU GAME.

“Whatever the number is we can get in the stadium I hope we get to that,” Brown said. “We are really going to need our fanbase this week. Kansas State is a Top 25 team, so I think it’s a critical matchup in our season, and I look forward to our guys responding in the right way and playing better this week.”