Box Score MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Brock Purdy threw three touchdown passes and ran for another, and the Iowa State defense kept West Virginia out of the end zone in this afternoon's convincing 42-6 victory at Jack Trice Stadium in Ames, Iowa.
 
With today's win, the 12^th-ranked Cyclones clinched their first conference regular season title in more than 100 years, and the 14,256 fans who were allowed inside the stadium to watch it thoroughly enjoyed themselves.
 
"We were soundly beat in every phase," West Virginia coach Neal Brown said. "The first half was by far the worst football that we've played to this point. I would say extremely disappointing would be putting it mildly."
 
Purdy was nearly perfect today completing 20 of his 23 pass attempts for 247 yards, while also rushing seven times for 38 yards.
 
In three career games against WVU - all double-digit Iowa State victories - the junior has completed 57-of-78 passes for 730 yards and seven touchdowns. 
 
He's also rushed for a pair of scores.
 
"If you look at all of their explosive plays, and I'm betting over half of those were him extending plays, whether it's him scrambling on a couple of third downs and one fourth," Brown said of Purdy.
 
Purdy's touchdown passes today covered 2 yards to receiver Landen Akers, 16 yards to tight end Charlie Kolar and 28 yards to running back Breece Hall coming out of the backfield.
 
Hall scored the game's first touchdown on a 23-yard scamper on Iowa State's opening possession of the first quarter and Purdy added a 10-yard jaunt early in the second quarter. 
 
Hall, the Big 12's leading rusher coming into this afternoon's action averaging 140 yards per game, maintained that status with an efficient 22-carry, 97-yard, one-touchdown effort against a Mountaineer defense that ranked fourth in the country allowing just 274 yards per game.
 
"This was our worst tackling performance of the year, but they did a good job of getting us isolated," Brown said.
 
The Cyclones (8-2) generated 483 total yards in a well-balanced attack that saw them gain 236 on the ground and 251 through the air.
 
"It was not our best performance," Brown said. "We didn't coach good enough, and we didn't play good enough."
 
Jon Heacock's Iowa State defense kept West Virginia out of the end zone for the first time this year and was working on a shutout early in the fourth quarter until Tyler Sumpter punched through a 36-yard field goal to make the score 35-3.
 
Sumpter also kicked a 36-yard field goal with 2:46 left.
 
"They're really good," Brown said. "I don't want to say anything to discredit them. They are playing their best football of the year. They played very well last week and they carried that over."
 
The running game, absent in West Virginia's three prior losses this year, was once again bottled up today. A fourth-quarter flurry enabled Leddie Brown to finish with 48 yards on 14 attempts, well below his 112.1 yards-per-game average.
 
"We couldn't sustain anything," Neal Brown said. "The line of scrimmage went back almost every time we tried to run. There was one drive where Leddie hit some good runs; I think they had their No. 2-D-line in for sure, and then they subbed their starters back in.
 
"Early on they shot their linebackers in gaps, which they hadn't done all year," Brown added. "We tried to double-team the down guys because we knew it was going to be difficult for us to maintain some one-one-one blocks. We switched some things up and they got really heavy in the B-gaps with their ends and we struggled at tackle, and that's probably putting it mildly."
 
Collectively, the WVU ground game accounted for just 54 yards on 25 attempts. In WVU's four defeats this year against Oklahoma State, Texas Tech, Texas and now Iowa State, West Virginia has failed to rush for 100 yards as a team.
 
"They were the more disciplined team. They were the more physical team. They dominated both line of scrimmages, and it wasn't even close, so credit to them," Brown said. 
 
Quarterback Jarret Doege tried 41 passes, completing just 21, for 209 yards. WVU was down a couple of regular receivers this afternoon and a couple of backups, Sean Ryan and Isaiah Esdale, led WVU with five catches each. Ryan went for a team-best 79 yards while Esdale accounted for 46 through the air.
 
Xavier Hutchinson led Iowa State with eight catches for 89 yards.
 
"Here's the deal, we're in year two and we're a lot better than we were a year ago – now it didn't show today," Brown said. "But we're a long way from where we need to be to be playing and competing to be in that championship game that's happening here at the end of the month.
 
"That was clear today, and that was something as a staff I knew," Brown added. "Up until this game, we were in every game throughout and in this one I don't know if we were in it past the first quarter, and they soundly beat us. They're playing with a lot of veteran guys. That quarterback has played a lot of games. They've had a bunch of offseasons (together) and that's a big, strong group that's been recruited for four, five years."
 
West Virginia (5-4) will conclude the regular season next Saturday at home against 13^th-ranked Oklahoma next Saturday. The Sooners are looking to clinch a spot in the Big 12 Championship game in two weeks with a win tonight against Baylor.
 
A game time has not yet been announced by the conference.