MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — A brief scare this week put Saturday’s WVU at Iowa State game in a little bit a jeopardy. The Mountaineers had several positive COVID-19 tests during Wednesday’s round of testing, which also caused a few players to quarantine due to contact tracing.
While the players involved likely won’t be revealed until just before Saturday’s game, Friday’s round of testing before WVU’s flight to Ames came back with a good result, according to Iowa State athletic director Jamie Pollard.
“Excited to share both West Virginia and Iowa State [football] teams passed COVID tests and we will playing (be) playing [Big 12] football on Saturday. Both WVU and ISU have been COVID clear for all 10 of their games this year — really amazing given what we were thinking back in August,” Pollard tweeted Friday morning.
While the game is still on, those who tested positive Wednesday and those forced to quarantine due to contact tracing will not be available. There could be big personnel changes for the Mountaineers, which is not ideal facing the No. 9 team in the nation on the road. Iowa State is also looking to clinch a spot in the Big 12 title game with a win.
While the playable roster and personnel are a big story this weekend, it will be for the next few weeks. In normal years, teams know which players exhausted their eligibility and won’t be back the next year. But with the eligibility freeze this year due to COVID-19, outgoing seniors can return for 2021, and discussions are under way for head coach Neal Brown.
With last week scheduled to be Senior Day before the postponement of the Oklahoma game to Dec. 12, he met one-on-one with all the seniors to get a feel for who may walk during the pregame ceremony.
“We had some preliminary discussions. I said, ‘Hey, if you know you want to come back, I don’t think there’s no sense in walking, but if you don’t just walk and if you want to come back later, then we’ll make it work,’ ” Brown said.
“We’ll have those in detail at the end of the regular season, so when we finish up the Oklahoma game before we get into bowl prep, those will be discussions for those seniors.”
There are a couple seniors with promising NFL prospects, including defensive tackle Darius Stills and linebacker Tony Fields, but there are many key contributors for the Mountaineers who are fringe pro players.
Wide receiver T.J. Simmons, center Chase Behrndt, safeties Alonzo Addae and Sean Mahone, defensive end Jeffery Pooler, and linebackers Josh Chandler and Dylan Tonkery will all have big decisions to make, and those decisions could have major ramifications for the 2021 roster.
While there may be individual conversations, with two top-10 matchups remaining for the Mountaineers, seniors want to get the 2020 campaign on the right foot, in case it is the end.
“Coach Brown spoke to the seniors about it, but he also let us know to focus on the now and we still have two very important games left on the season, so that’s our focus right now,” Addae said.
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