MORGANTOWN — For the first time this season, WVU head coach Neal Brown admitted both Jarret Doege and Garrett Greene will play moving forward, which he had already done against Long Island and Virginia Tech.
The adage is if you use two quarterbacks, you don’t have one, but with a different skill set between Doege and Greene, Brown believes he can utilize both effectively in different packages.
Brown has also taken that old adage, crumpled it up and tossed it in the trash through his head coaching career. At Troy, he used Brandon Silvers and Sawyer Smith in the passing game in 2017 and 2018, respectively, while Kaleb Barker was a change-of-pace QB for the running game.
With the way Doege and Greene have been used so far in 2021, a similar path is being taken. While Doege is the clear-cut starter and that doesn’t appear to be changing any time soon, Greene adds another dimension in the running game.
The problem, though, is figuring out when to make the move in-game. The decision will come Saturday, when the Mountaineers (2-1, 0-0 Big 12) face No. 4 Oklahoma (3-0, 0-0) on the road at 7:30 p.m.
“There’s only so many reps to go around, and there’s very little crossover with these two,” Brown said. “It’s probably more difficult for the defenses, but there’s some challenges when you’re putting together a gameplan because it’s really important that you keep everything for the offensive line the same. That’s where the challenge comes in. Like, OK, how much can you do? How can we present differently to the defense with each quarterback? And how you rotate them within a game — there’s a feel to it. Garrett, I don’t know if I have a total feel for him in games yet.”
Greene has eight pass attempts (seven against LIU) to his 18 rush attempts for 126 yards and two touchdowns.
Compare that to Doege, who doesn’t have a single rushing attempt that didn’t go down as a sack.
While obvious the coaching staff thinks Doege is the better passer, there is belief Greene can get there, but now isn’t the time.
Greene “did some really good things [against Virginia Tech],” Brown said. “There’s a couple that weren’t so good. But he ran the ball well. He can throw it. We haven’t asked him to do it as much, but he can. He has a really strong arm. There’s a science to it. We don’t have it completely figured out yet, but we’re working through it.”
TWEET @DominionPostWV
