Neal's deal: Five key items from West Virginia football
WVSports.com looks at the weekly press conference from West Virginia head coach Neal Brown and determines the five most interesting topics of discussion.
We examine what was said as well as what it means for the football team both this week and moving ahead as the Mountaineers navigate the 2024 schedule.
Next up is bye week before heading to Oklahoma State.
1—The good and the bad. West Virginia senior quarterback Garrett Greene needs to be more efficient throwing the football and both the signal caller and his head coach understand that. But against Kansas, Greene simply made a lot of plays especially when the game mattered most. There’s good and bad with the skill set that Greene brings to the table but it was on full display over the final two drives when Brown essentially felt the best opportunity was to spread out the Kansas defense and go to plays where it was 1-2 reads and then take off with the football. That isn’t always the best approach and Brown acknowledges that, but while there are some frustrating things that Greene does at times, he also brings skills to the table that simply can’t be coached. That requires some simple give and take.
Brown had learned that when they decide to do some things there is going to be some latitude taken by Greene and that is fine as long as he has his eyes where they need to be when he takes off and runs. But as a passer, Greene simply needs to consistently do what he needs to do with his feet in order to improve his completion percentage although he has shown the ability to throw the deep ball well.
There are a lot of different ways to play quarterback, and Greene might do it differently, but has shown the ability to excel when given freedom. For Brown, that means being more comfortable with some of the uncomfortableness of playing backyard football sometimes and taking the good with the bad.
2—Injury updates. West Virginia won’t play again until Oct. 5 against Oklahoma State, but after several players went down with injuries in the Kansas game Brown is optimistic about the outlook for each with the bye week coming at the right time. While there is no way to predict what could unfold with some of the upper body or head injuries during that game, Brown did state that he was hopeful the rest would return against the Cowboys which would be a boost for the Mountaineers.
One of those that remains in doubt is senior safety Aubrey Burks, who was taken out of the game on a stretcher on the sideline after a play. Brown again, was hopeful about his status but admitted those situations tend to take around five days to get a picture of where the recovery process is at and if Burks would be available for the next contest. But overall, positive news for West Virginia when it came to the current status of several injured players across the roster.
3—A big week for freshmen. West Virginia is set to practice Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday this week before the coaches hit the road to recruit on Friday and Saturday. The next week will begin with a practice Sunday before players are given an off-day Monday and then head into the typical game week. But as far as this week, West Virginia is set to scrimmage with their younger players on all three of those days this week in order to determine where some of those are at in terms of being able to help this team this season.
At defensive back, Brown wants to see if true freshmen such as Key’on Washington and Israel Boyce have both shown improvement in practice, but the coaches want to see where they’re at in terms of being able to step into a game and provide some snaps. The same can be said at running back as both Traevon Dunbar and Diore Hubbard are talented players but need to showcase that they can do more than run the ball whether that’s in pass protection, lead blocking, or any other aspect at the position.
On the defensive line, Nate Gabriel should see his role continue to grow but Brown wants to see Elijah Kinsler continue to show improvement because he is going to be needed to provide snaps there, too. And finally at wide receiver DayDay Farmer has seen game action, but Brown believes that he has the talent to help the team this year and he wants to see him practice better.
That’s just a few of the names that are going to get work, but there will be opportunities for many of them to prove that they are capable of playing more either in the base schemes or special teams moving forward.
4— Maturing as a play caller. The head coach was asked about his philosophy of dialing up plays and if he categorizes it as aggressive, conservative or somewhere in between. Brown said that the answer is in the eyes of the beholder, but he did say that the Mountaineers have been aggressive as far as going for it on fourth down as well as dialing up explosive pass plays down the field. But Brown also reminded that the Mountaineers are a run-based team and sometimes there is frustration if they elect to run the ball on third down as it’s often a two-thought process in order to set up to go for it on fourth down.
Each game is different with how Brown approaches it as a play caller and that has to do with both his personnel and the oppositions. But there’s a lot more to think about as the head coach than perhaps earlier in his career as he also understands the strengths and weaknesses of his own defense better than before. That means thinking about offensive play calling from a whole team perspective instead of just himself.
But ultimately it comes down to scoring points and while he hasn’t changed philosophies on that side of the ball, it’s about doing what gives his team the best opportunity to execute.
5—Pass defense improves. West Virginia hasn’t quite arrived in that area but in the first game where defensive coordinator Jordan Lesley joined co-defensive coordinator and secondary coach ShaDon Brown in the box, the unit played much better against Kansas. The plan is to keep Lesley in the box, but overall, from a schematic standpoint the head coach felt that the secondary did some better things such as executing their base coverages in quarters, cover three and other items.
The Mountaineers used two new cornerbacks in the game and Jacolby Spells made two critical errors but did some good things fundamentally, while TJ Crandall provided some quality snaps although he must do a better job at recognizing some things with different personnel in the game. Ayden Garnes shifted to nickel more Saturday than West Virginia would have liked but showed some positives as well as some things he needs to continue to improve. Some of the biggest issues from the Kansas game in terms of coverage came at the linebacker level as the Jayhawks were able to hit some plays underneath so that will need to be cleaned up.
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