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Musings from the Mountains: WVU Football Notebook

DISCUSS: Visit the Blue Lot to discuss West Virginia all year long

When does a college coach know what kind of team he has?

The answer is going to be different depending on every coach you ask but for head coach Dana Holgorsen it isn’t as much about where West Virginia currently is, instead where they could be.

To date there hasn’t been many surprises with this edition of the Mountaineers. The swing game to open the year didn’t go in their favor, but the program took care of three straight overmatched opponents to push its record to 3-1 and back inside the top 25.

The biggest test of the weekend will come this weekend on the road against a TCU team perched inside the top ten in both major polls. It’s a chance to rewrite the narrative for the season and propel the program even further up the Big 12 and national conscious.

Regardless of the result of this coming weekend, Holgorsen is excited to see how his team develops and grows over the next eight weekends. And while it might take 10 games to figure it all out, although that wouldn’t be ideal, Holgorsen is optimistic about the prospects of the team.

“I do think this team will keep getting better,” he said.

And if everything falls into place, the Mountaineers could be playing their best football at season’s end.

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Is there any formula for beating top ten teams?

Obviously if there was everybody would be using it. But when it comes to West Virginia, Holgorsen is a strong proponent on familiarizing his team with the opponent. There is no different approach regardless of the opposition but it comes down to knowing and understanding each team on the schedule.

While it took some time, the Mountaineers are now there. They’ve been to Fort Worth before; played in games there before and even won there before. But with that in the bag – there’s one thing left.

“Then you have to go in there and you have to play,” Holgorsen said.

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This will be the seventh all-time meeting between West Virginia and TCU with it currently deadlocked at three games apiece. The two programs have been intertwined since joining the league together in 2012 and have played some thrilling contests over the past five seasons.

The first three games were all decided on the final plays of the game, two of those coming in overtime.

Coincidentally, when West Virginia dropped the only other meeting between the two teams when ranked in 2014 it started an eight game losing streak against such opponents for the Mountaineers. Can West Virginia snap the streak where it all begin?

It’ll be easier said than done.

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