MORGANTOWN — The vultures can circle in bunches, and where it concerns the status of a college football coach, they don’t necessarily always come from above.
They strike from social media and regular media alike. TV, radio, or in the case of WVU head coach Neal Brown, even from star alums who are now TV personalities.
The words of former WVU kicker Pat McAfee last week during ESPN’s College Gameday did not go unheard in the state of West Virginia when he was asked to pick the most disappointing team in college football this season.
His answer: Brown and WVU, which then went on to lose handily by 38 points against Texas Tech.
“For me, personally, honestly, this is a real thing. The West Virginia Mountaineers have been the most disappointing team in my particular eyes,” McAfee said. “Because this has been four years in the Neal Brown’s ‘Trust the Process’ and I think they could have taken over the Big 12.”
McAfee’s choice apparently did not make its way into the WVU football offices.
“I can’t speak on it, because I didn’t see it,” Brown said Tuesday, as the Mountaineers began preparations to host No. 7 and undefeated TCU (7-0, 4-0 Big 12).
Yet Brown is human, and not a naive one at that.
Whatever frustrations and pressure that have come his way privately (i.e, from the school’s athletic department), rest assured those same frustrations have been on display publicly from the fan base, too.
Can it all simply be ignored by Brown? Probably not all of it, and the talk won’t go away until the Mountaineers’ fortunes change for the better.
That’s what circles above Milan Puskar Stadium this week, as Brown is also tasked with getting a team decimated by injuries to believe it can play with the No. 7 team in the country.
“It’s a good question, and I’m not trying to avoid it,” Brown begins. “When you look at it, I try to put it in a real perspective to (the players). This is important, because we’re investing a ton of time and resources into it, but if you look at things in your life that can go bad, this is easily fixable compared to those other things.”
Perceptions persist, Brown realizes that. He saw the smallest home crowd two weeks ago against Baylor — not counting the COVID-19 season — of his WVU coaching tenure.
Some things just can’t be ignored. Brown said he doesn’t go out of his way to try and shield his team from the criticism, but also knows those critiques from Twitter isn’t going to help someone perform or coach any better.
“For me, it’s about how you play the game,” Brown said. “Take the outcomes and put those aside. How did you play the game? What does your video look like? For me, that’s what we have to focus on. As a team, our video has got to be better. Individually, our video has got to be better. It’s got to represent who we want to be. That’s the challenge.
“That doesn’t have anything to do with what people are saying on social media. That doesn’t have anything to do with what is printed or said on TV or radio. It has to do with an individual choice that you’ve got to play better and we’ve got to coach better.”
The 48-10 loss to Texas Tech, Brown referenced it as not wanting that outcome to define his program.
“The way we’ve talked is we’re back to work,” he said. “I refuse to accept that’s who we are. That’s not who we were against Baylor. I refuse to accept that’s who we are as a football team. Failure is temporary, unless you accept it. I refuse to accept it and nobody that’s coaching here is going to allow that to be who we are.”
Would an upset over the Horned Frogs turn the tables against the detractors? In truth, Brown has a bigger picture in mind of what he’s trying to get accomplished that reach further than just one game.
“We just need to play better,” Brown said. “I never look at one game and say, ‘Oh, man.’ To me, we’ve just got to play better. I can deal with outcomes. If they beat us and we really play like we’re capable of playing, I can deal with that. To play like that (against Texas Tech), we’re not going to be about that.”
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