MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – With a season-opening victory over Georgia Southern in the books, West Virginia turns its attention to Saturday’s 3 p.m. matchup against Liberty at Milan Puskar Stadium.

 

Liberty is coming off a 32-13 victory over Delaware State last weekend in Lynchburg, the Flames’ quarterback Josh Woodrum throwing for 188 yards and two touchdowns and senior running back Desmond Rice contributing 139 yards and two scores on the ground.

 

Woodrum, a two-time All-Big South second team choice, has nice size (6-feet-3, 225 pounds) and shows up well on film, said West Virginia coach Dana Holgorsen.

 

“The ball comes out fast,” said Holgorsen.

 

Woodrum is approaching 8,000 career yards through the air to rank second in Liberty history. He’s also second all-time in career touchdown passes (51) and shows seven 300-yard passing games to his credit.

 

Woodrum’s No. 1 target is senior Darrin Peterson (No. 13), a Big South offensive player of the year candidate. Peterson caught eight passes for 83 yards and both touchdowns in Liberty’s 19-point victory last weekend and has more than 2,000 yards receiving for his career.

 

Peterson, at 6-feet-2 and 190 pounds, will give West Virginia’s secondary a much bigger challenge than it faced last Saturday against Georgia Southern’s run-oriented attack.

 

“(Peterson) is a guy that’s made a ton of plays for them,” said Holgorsen.

 

Backup tight end Will Johnson may be a familiar name to some Mountaineer football fans. The Osseo, Minnesota, resident began his college career at WVU before opting to transfer.

 

Defensively, Liberty has only five starters returning from last year’s unit that led the Big South in sacks with 29, but senior defensive end Chima Uzowihe (No. 52) is one of them. The 6-foot-2, 250-pounder had eight sacks a year ago and 19 ½ for his career.

 

Uzowihe will sometimes line up a little wider than usual to give him more space to rush the passer, something of which West Virginia’s tackles will have to be aware.

 

“He can get to the quarterback, so they are going to test our tackles more so than they were tested last week,” said Holgorsen. “I am pretty anxious to see that.”

 

West Virginia fans are also pretty anxious to see what improvements the Mountaineers can make from week one to week two. Holgorsen is most interested in seeing fundamental improvement, especially on special teams.

 

“Blocking and tackling,” he said. “I thought our coverage units were good last week, but I thought our blocking was average. We didn’t have many opportunities.

 

“There are some things we need to sew up on our PAT/Field goal team,” he added. “There were too many leaks on our PAT/field goals. Our operation time is so good that it didn’t affect it, but some of the bodies coming through there are going to be twitchy, faster and longer where we have to get some of that stuff sewn up.”

 

Defensively, the grade sheet against Georgia Southern was pretty clean. The Mountaineers limited the Eagles to just 224 yards in a 44-0 blanking – the second shutout victory at WVU under second-year defensive coordinator Tony Gibson.

 

Senior safety Karl Joseph had an outstanding game with three interceptions and a fumble recovery to earn AutoNation FBWAA Defensive Player of the Week and Big 12 Defensive Player of the Week honors. Joseph also recorded 8 tackles, seven of those solos. Linebacker Nick Kwiatkoski had six tackles and 1 ½ tackles for losses.

 

“I thought we tackled really well on defense,” said Holgorsen. “Looking back at it, it’s the best we have tackled since I have been here. I was pleased with that.”

 

West Virginia’s offense found a rhythm in the second half, scoring 14 points in the third quarter and finishing the game with 544 total yards.

 

Quarterback Skyler Howard completed 16-of-25 passes for 359 yards and two touchdowns before giving way to backup quarterback William Crest Jr., who led the second offense into the end zone late in the fourth quarter.

 

Sophomore Shelton Gibson and true freshman Jovon Durante became the first duo in school history to produce 100-yard performances in their first collegiate starts.

 

Gibson finished the game with 130 yards and one touchdown on three catches, while Durante had three catches for 121 yards and a touchdown – his first catch going for 41 yards and a touchdown.

 

Despite that, Howard thought their timing was a little off.

 

“If some of those balls were on the money they would have been uncontested catches and it makes it a lot easier on those guys,” he said.

 

Junior running back Wendell Smallwood was four yards shy of reaching 100 yards, on just 11 carries, and he also caught for passes for 23 yards to finish with 119 yards from scrimmage.

 

“He is one of our most dynamic guys out there,” said Holgorsen. “He had six explosive runs and we can use him multiple ways, but we didn’t have to do a whole lot with him this past game. We will keep trying to get him the ball as much as we can.”

 

Liberty is making its second appearance at Milan Puskar Stadium (a 33-20 WVU win in the 2009 opener) and the first for veteran coach Turner Gill, now in his fourth season with the Flames. The former Nebraska standout quarterback began his college coaching career at Buffalo before moving on to Kansas in 2010.

 

Gill has had a much more successful stint at Liberty, leading the Flames to an 8-4 record in 2013 and a 9-5 record last season.

 

“He’s had a bunch of success,” said Holgorsen. “I followed him when he was at Buffalo. He turned that program around. He is going on his fourth year at Liberty, and has had a winning record each year. That’s not surprising. He’s been around the game for a long time, and he is adapting from being a great player to a great coach.”

 

Saturday’s game will kick off at 3 p.m. and will be televised locally on ROOT Sports. Rob King, Dan Potash and former Mountaineer quarterback Marc Bulger will be in the booth to describe the action.

 

The Mountaineer Sports Network from IMG’s coverage will begin with the Mountaineer Tailgate Show at 11:30 leading into the game coverage at 2:30 with veteran play-by-play voice Tony Caridi, analyst Dwight Wallace and sideline reporter Jed Drenning.

 

Tickets are still available and can be purchased through the Mountaineer Ticket Office by calling 1-800-WVU GAME or by logging on to WVUGAME.com.

 

Saturday’s game is a Family Day, with a family of four receiving four tickets and a $25 concession voucher for just $150. Orders are being accepted online and through the Mountaineer Ticket office until halftime of Saturday’s game.

 

The ticket office will be open on game day from 11 a.m. until halftime.

 

A crowd of 53,000 is expected.