Radio sideline reporter Jed Drenning provides periodic commentary on the Mountaineer football program for WVUsports.com. Be sure to follow him on Twitter @TheSignalCaller.
 
 MANHATTAN, Kan. - Poor Steve Harvey.
 
Sure, the McDowell County, West Virginia-born comic has enjoyed a banner career. He's hosted "Showtime at the Apollo" and was featured in "The Original Kings of Comedy." He's appeared in a long list of movies and has won multiple Emmy Awards as a fixture for the last decade on "Family Feud."
 
But despite all that, there are still folks who most readily associate Harvey with his gaffe as the host of the 2015 Miss Universe Pageant. 
 
Harvey announced Miss Colombia as the winner. The problem? Harvey had misread the ballot card, which actually designated Miss Philippines as the correct winner. What followed were four of the most cringeworthy minutes in television history. Harvey, to his credit, returned to the stage to apologize after realizing the mistake. As he exited, a pageant official removed the crown from Miss Colombia and placed it on the head of a still slightly bewildered Miss Philippines.
 
Ouch. 
 
It was an honest error that nevertheless transformed Harvey into a viral internet meme for all the wrong reasons. 
 
But mistakes do happen.
 
If Steve Harvey's blunder was Exhibit A, let's jump to Manhattan, Kansas, last month on the day before Halloween for Exhibit B.    
 
K-State's Felix Anudike-Uzomah, a former blueshirt walk-on, was emerging as a force of nature against TCU. For the phonetically inquisitive folks in the crowd, that's pronounced ann-you-DEE-kay you-ZAH-mah. But we'll let Tony Caridi sort that part out during our broadcast on Saturday.  
 
The K-State fanbase has affectionately dubbed Anudike-Uzomah "King Felix" -- a suitable enough nickname considering the Horned Frogs would've happily paid a king's ransom to keep him out of their backfield. On that afternoon two weeks ago, Anudike-Uzomah was simply overwhelming. 
 
In the first quarter, Anudike-Uzomah knifed through a double team by left tackle Obinna Eze and running back Kendre Miller. On consecutive plays to end the first half, he beat Eze with back-to-back speed rushes. Later, he defeated another double-team by left guard Wes Harris and center Steve Avila. Less than 31½
minutes into the game, Anudike-Uzomah had already matched the Kansas State school record with four sacks; and he wasn't finished.
 
In the third quarter, Frogs' QB Chandler Morris tried to step up in the pocket but Anudike-Uzomah was there to give him a whack that jarred the ball loose, resulting in a recovery by the Wildcat defense in the end zone. And to close things out midway through the final quarter, Anudike-Uzomah – as part of just a three-man K-State pass rush --  spun free of yet another double team, this one by Eze and guard John Lantz, to get home and force another fumble by Morris. 
 
With a cool half dozen sacks, the Wildcats' sophomore edge rusher had tied the all-time FBS single game record. As his teammates danced in celebration around him on the sidelines, the camera zoomed in on King Felix to feature his ear-to-ear smile on the video boards as the public address announcer at Bill Snyder Family Stadium heralded his remarkable achievement to the thunderous approval of the 44,000-plus on hand to share in the excitement. Of course they were excited; they'd just witnessed NCAA history.
 
This carried over into the media sessions following the game as Anudike-Uzomah and his fellow Wildcats fielded question after question regarding the record-tying feat. Twitter was abuzz over the accomplishment, pointing out that Western Michigan's Ameer Ismail, in 2006, and Louisville's Elvis Dumervil, in 2005, were the only other players in FBS history to manage six quarterback sacks in one game. 
 
Anudike-Uzomah had made college football history! 
 
Now cue the needle-scratching-the-vinyl-record sound effect. 
 
That night, Anudike-Uzomah received a text. It wasn't from Steve Harvey, but it might as well have been.
 
A review of Anudike-Uzomah's performance against TCU prompted the NCAA to rule that – due to a technicality -- two of the six were not sacks. What was the snafu? On each of his final two takedowns, Anudike-Uzomah had forced Frogs' quarterback Chandler Morris to fumble the football forward, beyond the line of scrimmage, theoretically advancing the football for TCU before being recovered, in each case, by the Wildcats' defense. As such, his official sack total for the game was reduced from six to four. 
 
After enjoying his place in NCAA history for just a matter of hours, Anudike-Uzomah was stripped of that status but left with some not-too-shabby consolation prizes – a share of the K-State school record of four sacks and multiple national defensive player of the week honors. 
 
The truth is, Anudike-Uzomah doesn't need "national record holder" in his TikTok bio to demand your attention. According to Neal Brown, the effort he puts forth on video takes care of that.  
 
"The thing I respect watching him on film - he plays hard. You can try to chip him, you can try to double him. Some pass rushers, they get really frustrated, right? I haven't seen the kid frustrated. He plays extremely, extremely hard."
 
It's not lost on Brown that the defensive rotation used by the K-State staff helps set Anudike-Uzomah up for success. On average, Anudike-Uzomah has been on the field for just 39 of the 63 snaps the K-State defense has faced per game. You get the sense the K-State staff is still working toward a sweet spot with his reps. During the Wildcats current three-game winning streak, Anudike-Uzomah has racked up 7½ tackles-for-loss (one for a safety), including six sacks while forcing three fumbles, all while averaging a mere 33 snaps per contest during this stretch.
 
"They do a good job of getting him out of the game some – where he's fully rested all the time," Brown said. 
 
"He plays at a high level."
 
A high level indeed. Through just nine games, Anudike-Uzomah has already forced five fumbles to lead the country. It's been 13 years since a Big 12 defender forced more than that in an entire season. He tops the Big 12 in TFLs (13) and his sack rate of 1.22 per game is the best in college football. In fact, the last time a Big 12 pass rusher finished a season with a higher rate was 2009 when some guy named Von Miller averaged 1.27 sacks per game for Texas A&M.
 
An offseason transition by the K-State staff away from an even-front base defense to a more predominant three-man configuration has benefited the Wildcats, specifically against the pass. A year ago, K-State was last in the Big 12 in pass defense; this season it has climbed to No. 3. Kansas State is yielding just 223 yards per game thru the air despite allowing opposing quarterbacks to connect on a gaudy 69% of their throws (second-highest figure allowed by a Big 12 defense). 
 
K-State so consistently disrupts the pocket, while maintaining zone coverage on the backend, that quarterbacks are unable to let deeper routes develop and are, in turn, forced into hitting safety outlets or throwing check downs and screens -- the kinds of low-risk/low-yield options that do tend to inflate a team's completion percentage. KSU's 20 quarterback hits and 76 hurries are proof you don't have to get home with a sack to affect a pass play. For example, it's no coincidence that Stanford completed 10 short throws (for just 44 yards) to its running backs in a game that saw the Wildcats harass Cardinal quarterbacks Tanner McKee and Jack West all day with eight hurries and four sacks. That's the impact of pressuring the passer. 
 
Tasked with mitigating that impact on Saturday will be a West Virginia offense licking its wounds from last week's encounter with Oklahoma State. It will take an all-hands-on-deck effort from WVU to marginalize K-State's ability to apply pressure. That effort figures to include everything from the running backs chipping on the edge to the tight ends helping in pass protection and converted tackles wearing 90-something on their jersey. This aspect of the matchup will be an obvious priority. Neal Brown and his staff know that containing Anudike-Uzomah and his fellow pass rushers will be key if West Virginia hopes to get Jarret Doege humming versus the Wildcat defense.
 
Since making his first start as a Mountaineer two years ago in Manhattan, Doege has enjoyed considerable success against K-State, posting a career passer rating of 161.6 (his best versus any Big 12 opponent). In two contests against the 'Cats, Doege has connected on 65% of his throws with five touchdowns and no picks.
 
In West Virginia's win last year over then-No. 16 ranked Kansas State in Morgantown, however, the ground game was the difference on both sides of the ball. Leddie Brown cranked out 102 yards to pace a WVU rushing attack that finished with 185, while the Mountaineer defense allowed KSU to run the football for just 41 yards. 
 
Central to that effort by West Virginia was bottling up Wildcats dynamo Deuce Vaughn, limiting him to just 23 yards from scrimmage on 11 touches (nine rushes, two catches). The bad news? That showing against Vaughn was spearheaded by current Cleveland Brown Tony Fields II, who racked up a career-high 15 tackles in the game but obviously won't be available to record any takedowns for WVU on Saturday. A similar effort this weekend by the West Virginia defense against Vaughn -- who is No. 3 in the Big 12 in yards from scrimmage (143 per game) and No. 3 nationally in plays of 10-plus yards (44) – might be too much to ask, but WVU can't afford to give him an opportunity to take over the game. 
 
Kansas State quarterback Skylar Thompson, meanwhile, is playing the best football of his long career. Thompson, who entered the year with a career completion rate a whisker less than 60%, has connected on better than 71% of his throws through nine games. A knee injury ended Thompson's 2020 season in the team's third game and that might be contributing to his decreased role in the Wildcats' ground game. 
 
Thompson still presents a running threat in the red zone (where all four of his rushing touchdowns have come) but on third down he's now more inclined to use his athleticism to extend the play and look to throw rather than to tuck the ball and take off. The numbers reflect this. He's moved the chains on third down with his feet 38 times in his career but only two of those instances have come in 2021.
 
Throw in the coach's video of K-State's loss to Oklahoma and watch Thompson duck the Sooner pass rush on third down and 14. With OU linebacker DaShaun White retreating 20 yards deep between the safeties in a Tampa Two look, Thompson stepped up and saw open turf dead ahead. In past years, he would've run for the marker like he stole something. Instead, in this instance, Thompson redirected as he approached the line of scrimmage and broke toward the perimeter where he made a nifty flip to an open Vaughn. Vaughn scooted through the OU defense for a 20-yard pick up to move the sticks.    
 
Weaponizing his elusiveness in key situations like the one described above, not to run the football but as a means of extending plays and maximizing stress on a defense, has helped transform Thompson into a more formidable passer. This in part is evidenced by the fact that Thompson, who entered 2021 with a career completion mark of just 52.6% on third down, has catapulted that number up to 75% this season – No. 1 among Big 12 passers.
 
West Virginia has won five straight against K-State, including the last two in The Little Apple -- a sneaky streak if ever there was one. The Mountaineers might be pegged as a touchdown underdog by the folks in the desert but in many ways the 2021 edition of this battle between two blue-collar programs might be the biggest toss up so far. This game features a pair of evenly matched teams that are separated by just one spot in the Big 12 statistical ranks in scoring offense, scoring defense, total offense and total defense.
 
In a game so tightly paired, everything matters -- including the venue. This will mark the fifth time as a Big 12 member that West Virginia has visited Bill Snyder Family Stadium. Trust me when I say it's a tough spot for visitors.
 
In that stadium, the Wildcats pull you into a street fight and bait you into believing you have endless opportunities. You might even be in the lead for much of the game. Then you look up and realize 
they've hung around and made one more play than you (that 97-yard, fourth quarter kickoff return by Morgan Burns in 2015 still stings). When the purple fog clears, you often find yourself on the business end of an emotionally charged loss. You're left to sit on the team buses, gazing absently out the windows as they pull out behind a police escort, feeling like the 1,000^th team to let one get away from you in that building. 
 
That's Kansas State's modus operandi.
 
For Neal Brown's Mountaineers to grab another win in the House that Bill Built, it will mean once again flipping the script. They'll need to drag the 'Cats into a 60-minute battle, fill them with the hope that they'll prevail, then pull the rug out from under them with a late play to make the difference – much like Hakeem Bailey's leaping interception in the red zone with 28 seconds remaining to seal WVU's victory there in 2019. 
 
In other words, West Virginia might need to lure K-State into feeling like they have it in their grasp nearly to the bitter end, only to have it plucked away.
 
Just like Miss Colombia.  
 
I'll see you at the 50.