BYU's Bear Bachmeier didn't look like a freshman quarterback tonight against West Virginia.

Bachmeier passed for 351 yards and one touchdown and added another score on the ground in leading the 23^rd-ranked Cougars to a 38-24 victory over West Virginia Friday night at LaVelle Edwards Stadium in Provo, Utah.

BYU (5-0, 2-0) came into tonight's game averaging 251.3 yards per game rushing, but it was Bachmeier's downfield passing that proved to be the difference.

"We made him look like a Heisman winner in the first half," West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez said, "but I thought he was outstanding."

His first pass of the game went for 47 yards down the near sideline to Chase Roberts, and he continued pushing the ball down the field in the first half. Later in the first quarter, Bachmeier hit Parker Kingston in stride across the middle, and he turned on the jets to outrun the Mountaineer defense for a 54-yard touchdown.

A Bachmeier 85-yard pass completion to Chase Roberts set up LJ Martin's 4-yard touchdown run, and his 35-yard pass down the middle to Kingston put the Cougars in position for Bachmeier to call his own number from the 2 with just 22 seconds left in the half.

BYU's other first-half touchdown was set up by Therrian Alexander's 49-yard interception return to the WVU 3, and two plays later, Kingston got in from the 1.

West Virginia (2-4, 0-3) got a Kade Hensley 45-yard field goal to begin the second quarter and added a Diore Hubbard 3-yard touchdown run late in the half that was set up by safety Fred Perry's heads-up play. The senior tipped Bachmeier's option pitch and he nearly scored when he recovered the fumble right in front of BYU's goal line.

The Cougars' opening possession of the third quarter didn't get into the end zone, but it did result in more points while eating 7:59 of clock. BYU faked one field goal at West Virginia's 35 to kick a closer one from the 19 when Will Ferrin's kick split the uprights.

Later in the quarter, Perry once again set West Virginia up for more points when he punched the ball out of Jovesa Damuni's arms and Ben Cutter recovered the fumble at BYU's 22.

A Hubbard 9-yard run got the ball to the BYU 7, and two plays later on third down, Wilkins escaped pressure to score from the 6.

On BYU's next possession, Bachmeier resumed his aerial assault, completing passes of 5, 21 and 14 yards during a 12-play, 75-yard march that ended in West Virginia's end zone on Martin's 1-yard plunge.

West Virginia took over at its 25 and on first down, Khalil Wilkins completed his longest pass of the game, a 32-yarder down the near sideline to Jeff Weimer. A pass interference penalty called on the Cougars gave the Mountaineers a first down at their 16, and then a personal foul penalty called on Keanu Tanavasa after hitting Wilkins late gave WVU a first down at the 7.

The Mountaineers got the ball inside BYU's 1, but Hubbard couldn't punch it in on fourth down. The 74-yard march was West Virginia's longest drive of the game.

"We need a lot of help ... you can't get it in from the 1-inch line and we got pushed around on both sides of the ball," a frustrated Rodriguez said. "We can't pass protect when we call a long pass, and we can't get open enough against press-man coverage."

After BYU's goal line stand, West Virginia forced BYU to punt, and Scotty Fox Jr. came back into the game after playing briefly in the first half to get the Mountaineers back into the end zone. He completed all three of his pass attempts, his third going to Cam Vaughn for a 29-yard touchdown.

"I thought Scotty came in and made some nice passes," Rodriguez said.

Wilkins, the other freshman starting quarterback in tonight's game, ran 23 times for 89 yards and completed 7-of-15 passes for 81 yards with two interceptions. One of those picks should have been a long completion, but Vaughn was unable to hang on to Wilkins' pass and the ball bounced into Tanner Wall's arms.

Wilkins could have had another touchdown pass in the second half but that one was dropped, too.

"He played hard," Rodriguez said of his young quarterback. "I think he'd like to have some plays back, but that was a tough environment to make your first start."

Roberts finished the game with four catches for 161 yards and Kingston added 111 on his four receptions for BYU. Cougar receivers had 216 yards after the catch tonight.

The West Virginia defense has allowed 532 and 516 yards in its last two Big 12 losses.

After six games, a beat-up Mountaineer team will welcome an idle weekend next Saturday. WVU remains on the road to play at UCF on Saturday, Oct. 18.