MORGANTOWN — The time-warp portion of Saturday’s spring game featured Karl Joseph, menacing as ever in his No. 8 jersey, and Rasheed Marshall, lean as ever in the No. 2.
Secretive returnees modeling secretive uniforms. And after watching West Virginia scrimmage for 96 plays, it remains very much a secret how the current players on this team will mesh come next season.
As new coaches modify everything from playbooks to practice-music playlists, the transition intrigues at every turn. In a game the Gold team won 25-9 over the Blue, here were my questions:
- How much should we read into Jack Allison throwing 24 passes while Austin Kendall attempted half as many?
- Are both the offensive and defensive lines in desperate need of graduate transfers?
- Can a mostly experienced secondary patch the leaks that surrendered completions of 60 and 40 yards, not to mention a final-play, 28-yard touchdown?
- Will Marcus Simms, the top returning pass-catcher for the Mountaineers, actually be returning at all?
T.J. Simmons didn’t quite match the receiving numbers Simms put up last season, but there’s no disputing his emergence as the unit leader at present.
When a first-quarter run fake drew in the defense, Simmons slipped behind the coverage and caught the game’s longest pass from Kendall. An explosive play for the junior whose voice was featured on a pregame video. After being tucked behind future NFL draftees David Sills and Gary Jennings, Simmons wasn’t about to duck the spotlight.
“A lot of people have been coming up to me and saying I’m the face of the team now. They see me all over the pictures and the video,” Simmons said. “Last year we were seeing David’s picture everywhere. Now it’s me and it feels good. It’s an honor.”
Lest we attach too much pomp to Simmons’ 60-yard score, recall how in last September’s debut he scorched Tennessee for a 59-yard touchdown, which turned out to be his only one of the season.
Simmons laughed about his mindset after that game in Charlotte, assuming he would “keep it going” with a slew of follow-up TDs. Instead, Sills and Jennings combined for hog 28 of them and Simmons adjusted to a complementary role.
He can’t settle for being a sidekick any longer, and won’t. Helping replace all that offensive production is crucial. So is being a wireless charger for his teammates.
“If my backups and the young guys aren’t playing good, the coaches will say it’s up to me to bring them up,” Simmons told me Saturday. “If the surrounding cast isn’t good, it doesn’t matter how good I play.
“When I have a bad practice, everybody has a bad practice. Coach Brown is like, ’It’s on you. If your morale is down, theirs is down.’ So I pick them up with my energy.”
The defensive line — regardless of what the NCAA’s free-agent market yields over the next six weeks — depends on the massive upside of Dante Stills.
The four-star recruit from Fairmont is playing at 290 pounds now, energized to become a disrupter at defensive tackle, where his athleticism ranks above-average, as opposed to feeling a step slow last season at defensive end. If Stills has a monstrous sophomore season, it will be in part because Vic Koenning’s scheme encourages the beefy interior guys to attack line of scrimmage instead of playing gap control.
“They want me to be a leader, to be ‘that guy’ — and I want to be that guy,” Stills said. “To be that dude on the field and work hard every play.”
Stills made one first-half tackle Saturday before a mild ankle injury forced coaches to be cautious.
“Just a little sprain,” he said. “Ain’t nothing serious.”
The serious part comes 140 days from now, when West Virginia kicks off the 2019 season. In the interim, there’s a quarterback competition to clarify and personnel additions to make. How those play out will determine whether the outlook looms as bright as WVU’s all-yellow uniforms, or as muted as those gray alternates.
