West Virginia head coach Neal Brown isn’t sure who is going to get the start for the Mountaineers at quarterback this coming week but don’t expect him to make an announcement either way.
Redshirt senior quarterback Garrett Greene returned to practice after being sidelined since halftime of the Kansas State game where redshirt sophomore Nicco Marchiol has filled in admirably in his stead. Marchiol led the Mountaineers to back-to-back road wins over Arizona and Cincinnati, with mixed results with his play.
Against Arizona, Marchiol completed 18-22 passes for 198 yards with 2 touchdowns and zero turnovers but those numbers were just 9-15 for 156 yards with a score and a pick.
“He just has to be consistent with his fundamentals. That’s the biggest difference between him being super, super efficient against Arizona and playing at a high level and then I’m not playing as well on Saturday,” head coach Neal Brown said. “It’s all correctable things. It’s little things.”
The sixth-year head coach pointed to one play where if Marchiol would have got his eyes on the backside safety there was the potential of an explosive play down the field to Traylon Ray and some more instances where if he takes the correct drop it aids in the timing.
But there were some positives as well as Marchiol had a nice run on his touchdown scramble and also did a nice job throwing the ball down the field on go-balls.
Greene participated in some 7-on-7 in practice Monday and is expected to move into full 11-on-11 Tuesday and the coaching staff will then make a determination on where the position is at heading into Baylor. Greene hasn’t done much in terms of football since leaving the Kansas State game so how he responds to the big layoff will be critical in determining where he is at in terms of potentially starting this coming weekend.
“I need to see him in 11-on-11 before we make a decision whether he’s ready to go,” Brown said.
Either way, there are benefits to making Baylor prepare for both options. While the offense isn’t going to change a ton, there are differences in the fact that Greene is right-handed and Marchiol is left, while there are some other strengths in how they call the game depending on which one gets the call.
“Part of the reason that we’re not is so they don’t know,” Brown said. “I’m not trying to hide that.”
West Virginia will make a determination on who gets the start later this week but don’t expect anything concrete to be announced until kickoff approaches at 4 p.m. Saturday.
“We’ll get both the quarterbacks ready, y’all can ask a bunch of questions about them but I’m not going to say anything. You can ask, everybody has the right to ask. I want to see how Garett does. We’ll make some decisions as the week goes but really not going to comment on it,” Brown said.
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