WVU win wasn't exactly satisfying

[elp525]

September 5, 2009

By Mitch Vingle
Sports Editor

MORGANTOWN - They tried.

One by one, West Virginia's players labeled their 33-20 home opening victory over Liberty a success.

"A win's a win,'' said offensive lineman Josh Jenkins. "I'm happy with it.''

"A win is a win, no matter what the score is,'' echoed teammate Alric Arnett. "If it's 2-0, it's a win.''

"I feel good to be undefeated,'' said defensive tackle Scooter Berry. "Like Coach Stew said, some other team in America wants to have this score right now. Some teams didn't win.''

Of course, Coach Stew - Bill Stewart - gave his version.

"I'm very proud of the win,'' he said. "We'll never ever look down on a victory.''

Then, little by little, inch by inch, the frustration leaked.

"I'm not pleased with the kickoff [coverage],'' Stewart said.

And . . .

"[Liberty's] crossing routes were frustrating.''

"I think we wish we would have had some more touchdowns,'' said left tackle Don Barclay.

"A win is always good,'' said WVU center Joe Madsen, "but we just know there's a lot of things to be worked on.''

"I'm satisfied,'' Berry later smiled. "For the most part.''

Indeed, Liberty didn't pull an Appalachian State-over-Michigan on these Mountaineers. But neither did West Virginia pull an Air Force-Tennessee-Michigan State-Purdue-Kentucky-Boston College-Northwestern on the Flames. Those teams put up 72, 63, 44, 52, 42, 54 and 47, respectively, on lesser foes Saturday.

A program like West Virginia is supposed to blow out the Flames as if on a birthday cake. Like back in the day. WVU put up 52 on Eastern Washington in 2006. Scored 62 on Western Michigan in '07. Heck, threw 48 on Villanova last season.

Teams like Liberty work to win such a game. They hope to win. They expect to lose.

"We had communicated [to our players] about this game for quite some time,'' said Liberty coach Danny Rocco. "We had hopes and expectations of playing well enough to win. We're disappointed that we did not win the game - but there were some really positive things.''

When you're seeing positive things in a loss, well, you expected to lose.

The Flames have some nice players. In fact, some very nice players. Quarterback Tommy Beecher played a terrific game, completing 22-of-33 passes for 210 yards. Receiver/quarterback/holder Mike Brown, who had 157 receiving yards (as well as two killer kick holds), is a stud. Asa Chapman, who WVU decided not to re-sign, is a 6-foot-5, 360-pound nose guard.

But almost every team in America has a few nice players.

WVU? Well, as promised, quarterback Jarrett Brown was sharp. He completed 19-of-26 passes for 243 yards and ran for 69 more with a score. He was calm. He was strong.

Tailback Noel Devine finally exposed his jets near the game's end with a 24-year touchdown. He finished with 112 yards.

"Those two guys,'' Rocco said, "are as advertised.''

The Mountaineer offense might have even been more than advertised. With a young offensive line, a new quarterback, etc., one might have expected it to struggle a bit in the opener.

It did - to a degree - settling for four field goals, but rolled up 438 yards and averaged 7.3 yards per play.

What was somewhat disappointing was the WVU defense, which was expected to prop up the offense early in the year. The Mountaineers, loaded with Chris Neild, Reed Williams, J.T. Thomas, etc., allowed 299 yards to the Flames. That's an average of 5.1 yards per play - vanilla schemes or not.

Also, it allowed the last touchdown that switched the score from a more respectable 33-13 to the final 33-20.

"You want to start strong; you want to finish even stronger,'' Berry said. "There were a couple of miscommunications, a couple of slip-ups.''

They were nothing, though, compared to the kickoff coverage snafus.

At one point, near the end of the first half, the crowd cheered when a WVU kickoff went out of bounds. It was that bad.

Improving kickoff coverage was said to be Stewart's pet project after finishing 117th nationally last season.

The project, though, apparently caught the attention of Rocco.

"I made a decision in February to change our kickoff return,'' said the Liberty coach. "I knew they'd put a lot of time in that.

"So we went to a very unique scheme. Put a lot of thought into it. They were preparing for a sideline [return] and we gave them a middle wedge.''

It had Stewart making three personnel changes until "we got it down to nothing,'' he said.

WVU had seven penalties for 69 yards. The defense forced but one turnover.

All in all, it could not have been a satisfying win. Not for a team expected to challenge for a Big East title.

"We learned we have a lot of work to do,'' Arnett said.

Someone once told me, though, a win is a win.

[wvumaryjane]

I think Mitch is spot on in this article.. Though I did NOT see much of the game, it seems we couldn't click much on either side of the ball.. And 20 points given to Liberty? And it seems we couldn't punch into the end zone..

I'm hoping they fix a LOT of stuff before next weekend.. East Carolina is coming to Morgantown and they are ALWAYS someone to be concerned with.

[joemountaineer]

I was at the game. Couple of observations from my viewpoint. You could tell this is an entirely new offensive line. They struggled at times, did some really good things at times. There were plays where Jarrett had all day to pass, then there were breakdowns. Thankfully, JB can run and he converted some lost yardage plays into positives. He had nice stats and if there hadn't been three dropped passes by tight ends, they'd have been even better stats. I think our tight ends are still shocked they are part of the passing gameplan.

The kickoff coverage is just really out of sync. I don't know why Stew hasn't added a strictly special teams coach, he's got to let that go and let someone else do it. He's the head coach, it's okay to delegate even that responsibility. I can't knock Stew for much at this point becaase he's really surrounded himself with some good coaches, I just wish he'd give up handling the special teams. Hell, I'd be for him just having it kicked out of bounds and let every team start on the 40 yd line than risk the return at this point. It's really THAT bad.

Overall, I think there were a lot of factors in why this game turned out the way it did. # 10 for Liberty is a total stud, he's their mister everything and he showed everyone why. I think Liberty's coaches had an excellent game plan to deal with WVU's defense. They had an excellent game plan overall I thought. They were able to confuse WVU's D at times. Let's not forget, Beecher was the starting quarterback for South Carolina not too long ago. You see, SC's got this head ball coach, some guy named Spurrier, who seems to have a knack for finding really good quarterbacks. I know Beecher had an awful outing in his SC debut, never recovered, so he transfered. But the kid has talent. And I'll hand this to him, he's one tough SOB because WVU laid the hammer on him several times and he stayed in the game. Liberty has a lot of kids who transfered in from D-1 programs so their not your average 1-AA, FCS whatever you call them now team. Liberty is going to do well in FCS play this season, and I'll call it now, they will likely be a big factor in the FCS playoffs.

Positives: JB looked good, and looked confident and he's one smart quarterback. He did well with his reads, knew when he needed to take off and run, didn't force any passes (although he did under pressure toss up a ball one time which could have been picked and he should have just ate the ball). There was one play he took a deep loss going out of bounds when he should have thrown the ball away. But overall, I think JB is going to be more than adequate. No, he's not going to make us forget old # 5 anytime soon, but it always takes a long, long time ffor the legends to fade into memory. Speaking of legends, saw Major Harris at the game walking the sidelines. It's high time Maj's name graced the walls of Milan Puskar along with Sam Huff's and Ira Errett Rodgers' names which are already on the north end zone wall.

Other positives - Tyler Bitancurt is a good kicker, I'm not worried about the field goal kicking this season. The receivers looked good, Wes Lyons made a nice grab, too bad he got nicked up. I hope he's destined for a break out season.

I'd say my overall grade is a C performance from WVU, they got some film to look at now, and let's see what they learn from it. ECU is going to be better than Liberty and WVU has work to do to get ready.

I hope to God Coach Stew is on the phone to some special teams coaches trying to get them here, or getting advice because otherwise WVU is going to drop a game or two because of big kick off returns.

[mountaineerinpa]

Your right Joe. Expect to see ECU to come to Morgantown with CROSSING ROUTES. Until WV stops it they will see it continuely. Kickoff coverage was BAD BAD. I also think Stew need to find someone to coach them. The next game is the mark as to how good this team will be and how good are coaching staff really is. well we know how good the coaches are whether they can relay that to the team and how they perform next week is the key

[smiteedawgwv]

When I left Morgantown yesterday I wasn't very pleased, but after watching it this morning my perspective changed dramatically. First off I'll agree with Joe, Mike Brown is a hell of a ball player and honestly I'm wondering why he's not playing for a BCS school. Kickoff coverage in the second half was excellent, hopefully the personnel changes Stew made has corrected that problem already. JB looked really good, although in the first half there were OPEN receivers several times which you couldn't see on TV, but was obvious from my vantage point in section 202. And by the way, the man can run!! Penalties in key situations was a problem, but as I recall they were all personal fouls and interference, I don't remember any procedure or holding calls which is outstanding for the first game. It's obvious that anything close to a head to head blow will be called by the refs this year and I think they were all good calls except for the one called on JT late in the second half. A few defensive lapses pissed me off but JT, Lazear and Miller looked outstanding. I hated giving up that last TD but I noticed several starters on the sideline during that series, which means the reserves need to get better. I was totally pleased with Bitancurt which was one area I was concerned with. Overall it wasn't the blowout we expected, but it really wasn't that bad, especially compared to last year when we couldn't get Villanova off the field. Yes there's work to be done, but there always is this early in the season. Again, there are some things that need to be ironed out, but I honestly believe we're way better than we were this time last year and it's going to be a very good season!!

[dehayes35]

Thanks for your thoughts, everyone! I LOVE reading these post-game reviews...makes me feel like I was there, even though I wasn't.

[mountaineerinpa]

The one thing that I have come across that concerns me is you have 5 trips in the red zone and you get 4 FG and 1 TD. That needs to improve BIG TIME.

[joemountaineer]

Agree Mountaineer, WVU left some touchdown's out there for sure, this game could easily have been 50 sometthing to twenty, just some mistakes a key points. It was the first game, and they say you improve the most from game one to game two. From what I'm hearing, ECU didn't play well in their debut. I'm hoping for a much better effort by WVU this weekend and a confidence building win for the team. Unfortunately, I will miss the game as I'm going to Washington D.C. to take part in a march there. So my daughter and her friend will be there in my place. Everyone root on the Eer's extra hard for me this weekend, k??