There is a standard of 90% Neal Brown goes by whenever he grades WVU receivers.
As in the Mountaineers’ wideouts are expected to catch at least nine out of the 10 passes thrown their way that are deemed catchable.
In going back watching film of WVU’s 38-20 loss against Texas, the receivers where nowhere near Brown’s expectations.
WVU quarterback J.T. Daniels threw 19 incomplete passes that evening, and by Brown’s count, WVU had seven flat-out drops.
“Six of those were by the wideouts,” Brown said. “The timing was fine, that really wasn’t an issue. It comes down to fundamental errors.
“So, having seven (drops) is not catching 90%. When you go back and look at it, some of them were just straight fundamental issues.”
The issues Brown demonstrated himself during his weekly press conference.
He showed how a receiver’s hands are supposed to be out in front when they come out of their break. If it’s an over-the-shoulder situation, a receiver’s hands should still be high near their head, rather than trying to corral the ball near their belly.
On the drops, Brown said it was more a situation of the receivers not having their hands in the right place.
“A lot of our drops aren’t necessarily hand-eye coordination issues,” Brown said. “They’re more hand placement and fundamental issues.”
Brown said a lack of depth at receiver has also hurt, in that Bryce Ford-Wheaton, Kaden Prather and Sam James have been asked to play most of the snaps without much of a break.
Who comes after them? Brown said he’s got to get Jeremiah Aaron and Reese Smith more playing time.
“Both of those guys are capable of playing more,” Brown said. “We’ve got to get Cortez Braham going.”
Tough running
WVU’s 61 rushing yards against the Longhorns is a season low, and Brown said Texas’ talented defensive lineman were the cause of much of that.
“There’s two things. First of all, they had good players. They’re defensive tackles were really good,” Brown said. “On us, we didn’t do as good a job of getting movement. Who we were indentifying was good and our communication was good, but we didn’t do a good enough job of getting movement off our double teams and off to the second level. Their (linebackers) were making plays untouched. We’ve got to be better at that.”
Looking ahead to Baylor (3-2, 1-1 Big 12), the Bears’ defensive front could pose just as many problems.
Baylor is second in the conference in rushing yards allowed (98.3 per game), and the Bears haven’t allowed any individual to rush for more than 75 yards in a game.
Even that wasn’t a running back, rather it was Oklahoma State quarterback Spencer Sanders who rushed for 75 yards in the Cowboys’ 36-25 win against Baylor last week.
Recruiting glance
With an off week Saturday, Brown said his coaching staff spent their Friday night at high school games across the state and region.
“We’d like to continue to add some high school guys. We’ve got to hold on to the commits we’ve got,” Brown said. “We’ve got some guys who are having some really big senior years right now, so we’re excited about those.”
Currently, WVU has 17 verbal commitments from high school players for the 2023 recruiting class. Brown said he’d like to have “in the low 20s” by the time the December signing period begins.
At that point, WVU will begin to look at the transfer portal to fill immediate needs.
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