Holgorsen's Take: Kansas Postgame
No. 8/9 West Virginia remained undefeated Saturday with a 38-22 win over Kansas at Milan Puskar Stadium.
Though the score showed what could be interpreted as a convincing win, that wasn’t the case as the Mountaineers played a sloppy game that was filled with mistakes and miscues.
Specifically on offense, West Virginia had problems with red zone efficiency which is an area the unit has been solid in this season. The Mountaineers were 5-for-8 in the red zone, but those three misses were interceptions thrown by Grier.
West Virginia was 15-for-15 in the red zone coming into Saturday’s game and despite the three turnovers in the red zone, head coach Dana Holgorsen isn’t concerned, drawing comparison’s to last week’s game against Texas Tech, where the Mountaineers nearly allowed the Red Raiders overcome their 25-point deficit in the second half.
“Just like last week, I don’t think we’re a bad second half team just because we’re not good with one particular thing last week,” Holgorsen said. “We’ve been pretty good in the red zone. I don’t really think it’s a problem. (We) just probably made some bad decisions; probably made some bad decisions play-call wise and we probably made some bad decisions at the quarterback spot.”
Grier fumbled the ball once to go along with his three interceptions. Holgorsen said these interceptions were a combination of not doing good in the run game and Kansas’ defense dropping a lot of players in coverage, forcing Grier to throw in some tight spots.
“He has the confidence to make any throw and every throw,” Holgorsen said. “That’s why he’s one hell of a quarterback, but those windows become small. I thought their defenses did a better job of attack the ball better than our receivers did.”
On the stat sheet though, one of the bright spots offensively for West Virginia was the unit’s run game.
The Mountaineers, who have rushed for over 100 yards in each game, but have been somewhat inconsistent in that area, were effective against the Jayhawks, rushing for 177 yards on 39 carries, averaging 4.5 yards per carry.
True freshman Leddie Brown led the run game with 11 carries for 107 yards and a touchdown. He also added a 15-yard reception for West Virginia’s first touchdown of the game.
Holgorsen emphasized the team’s need to run the ball more and said the reason why other teams have had success in the run game against Kansas is due to the Jayhawks primarily showing a three-man front and dropping more players into coverage.
“That’s one reason why they get interceptions is because you’re throwing the ball into a lot of coverage, so you run the ball,” Holgorsen said. “If we don’t get better at running the ball, we’re going to have a hard time winning ball games moving forward.”
Defensively, Holgorsen was pleased with the group’s performance and how they responded following the offense’s turnovers. What helped the defense out too when it came to the turnovers were the turnovers occurring deep in Kansas territory since it they didn’t give Kansas a short field.
“Our field position was really good,” Holgorsen said. “They gave up a couple of third-and-longs that we weren’t very happy with in the second half, but other than that, the guys on defense keep doing a good job. I’m proud of how they’re being coached and how they’re playing.”
At the end of day, Holgorsen and the Mountaineers are happy to be 5-0, but know there’s a still a lot of work to do and things to improve on moving forward.
“You’re going to have games like this. Don’t ever take a win for granted in the Big 12. You enjoy every one of them,” Holgorsen said. “We’re 5-0 and we know as a team that we got a lot of things that we need to work on. That’s a healthy place to be because our guys know there’s a lot of things that we need to work on and we’ll get back to work and try to iron some of that stuff out.”
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