MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — The glimpses have been there according to West Virginia defensive coordinator Vic Koenning, but then they have disappeared almost as quickly as they developed.
Case in point was the Mountaineers 29-24 victory against Kansas two weeks ago.
Late in the third quarter, Koenning liked what he was seeing until Andrew Parchment caught a 75-yard scoring pass on a simple post pattern that brought the Jayhawks within three points of tying the game.
“They were under 200 yards until they hit that 75-yarder,” Koenning said. “Then we just kind of let everything go. That’s not who we want to be.”
Koenning explained the Mountaineers had a defender who was supposed to cover the deep post route, but the defender instead went after a receiver running an underneath pattern.
In Saturday’s game, that’s all it takes to ruin what could have been a building-block type of game.
Koenning has seen it too much and not just with the Mountaineers, but around the nation, too.
“It’s an epidemic here where some are trying to do everyone else’s job,” Koenning said. “It’s an epidemic everywhere. You watch cut-ups of other teams and you see guys wanting to make every tackle instead of doing their own job. Because then they can stand up and do all of that stuff like hit their chest and do some gyrations. That’s an ongoing everyday, several-times-a-day deal. We have to keep coaching that so that guys do understand their fits and do their job.”
As it stands, the Mountaineers are right in the middle of most of the Big 12 defensive categories.
While the Mountaineers are eighth in points allowed (25.5 ppg), WVU is sixth in total yards allowed (374) and fifth in passing yards allowed (201.5) in what is a pass-happy Big 12.
They will surely be tested by Texas, which features a dual-threat quarterback in Sam Ehlinger, while the Longhorns average just under 500 yards of offense per game.
“We’ve got to play a lot better than we have,” Koenning said. “I’m still not at all satisfied with our performance at K.U., which was the last game we played. We actually played really well into we gave up that post, which almost gave me a Prilosec moment. We have a guy to cover the post. He just has to do what he’s supposed to do.”
Ehlinger comes in completing nearly 73% of his passes and he’s thrown for 1,237 yards and 15 touchdowns.
The junior has also rushed for 191 yards and a score.
“They take shots down the field and they hit those shots,” WVU head coach Neal Brown said. “This is the best offensive team we’ve played.”
Defending those deep shots will be a top priority for the Mountaineers.
“Here’s the deal: The best we can do is better than what we’ve shown,” Koenning said. “I truly believe our guys have not even got as close to doing as good as what they can do. We have a lot of execution issues that we have to clean up. We have to tackle this quarterback. We’re going to do everything we can to be successful.”
