MORGANTOWN — With West Virginia leading Baylor 51-14, Jack Allison’s 36-yard pass to Gary Jennings on the opening play of the fourth quarter became the backup quarterback’s first career touchdown.
It marked the final play of the game for the other offensive starters.
“We thought Jack deserved to go at least one drive with the ones, so we didn’t sub anybody out,” Mountaineers offensive coordinator Jake Spavital said.
“We knew they’d be in a Cover 2. Jack did a great play fake. The footwork was great — I was watching him pretty critically — and he held that back-side safety with his eyes and delivered a good ball.”
Allison held his follow-through pose on the pass and glimpsed over at Spavital on the sideline.
The coordinator’s reaction was far different later in garbage time, when the lanky Allison timidly kept an option read and was blasted by safety Christian Morgan.
“Boy, he got smoked,” Spavital said. “I was laughing so hard. I thought he broke both his legs for a second, but he said he was good.”
The team’s presumed quarterback for 2019, Allison netted 43 yards on 4-for-4 passing.
“I wouldn’t recommend him keeping his own reads, though,” advised coach Dana Holgorsen. “He about got split in half.”
All eyes on Texas
Saturday brings an off day for West Virginia players, and several plan to be watching next week’s opponent when No. 6 Texas visits Oklahoma State.
“Sometimes on that TV copy you can’t see the back-end stuff, so I’ll probably just watch it as a fan,” receiver David Sills said. “Then Sunday we’ll get after them and dig into who they really are.”
Already given an extra two days of preparation, Holgorsen doesn’t mind the Longhorns kicking off at 8 p.m. Eastern in Stillwater.
“They’re on the road Saturday night so it could be an advantage for us,” he said. “We’ll take every one we can get.”
