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 2019 schedule.

1—One team’s success doesn’t mean it will be repeated. To say Wyoming was able to run the ball against Missouri might be an understatement. The Cowboys piled up almost 300 yards on the ground and averaged over 7 yards per carry ripping off a number of runs throughout the game. Sounds like the perfect recipe for a rushing attack that only mustered 34-yards against an FCS opponent, right? Well, not so fast because there are some differences in how the two teams attack on the ground.

Wyoming used a lot of 12 and 21 personnel with multiple tight ends to shift and trade in order to catch Missouri out of gaps to get yards on the ground while also mixing in a highly athletic quarterback that created yards on the ground with his feet in Sean Chambers. The Cowboys only attempted six passes, but Chambers rushed for 120 yards on 12 carries with a long run of 75-yards.

West Virginia obviously does not have a highly mobile quarterback and is young at the tight end spot so that personnel isn’t going to translate to what the Mountaineers can do on the field. Can West Virginia have success rushing the ball against Missouri? Sure, but it isn’t going to be a walk in the park based off what happened to the Tigers in their surprising week one defeat.

2—Getting them moving. West Virginia’s offensive line did a good job when it came to targeting and body position but they didn’t move the James Madison defense due to being timid and not coming off the ball as hard. A lot of the linemen up front were seeing significant action for the first time but now they have to work on not only being in the right spot but that physical element to get a push up front. That element was lacking in the run game and while Brown joked that he didn’t know if his team would come out and run the ball like they do at Army, he does think that it can improve.

Now with more snaps for the offensive line, Brown believes that he can get his group to be more physical up front. The same could be said on the perimeter for a different reason as the wide receivers simply didn’t handle what they needed to do from a technique aspect. Those struggles were just as big of a part of the issues with the run game as anything else and it has to improve.

3—Finding the right graduate transfers was key for 2019. It won’t always be this way but this year Brown wanted to make sure that he found the right players in order to help establish a culture for his program moving forward. That meant who he brought into the program needed to be players that were going to help foster that outlook instead of taking chances on perhaps even more talented players. Brown knew people attached to each of the three late graduate transfer additions and was able to get an idea of what he was getting not only on and off the field with each.

The idea was to help plant those roots in order to help the transition of a new coaching staff but eventually down the road Brown could weigh talent more than some of the character elements. Talent is something that is going to be key looking at future graduate transfers to help inject an immediate help to certain positions but this year was about finding the right guys and each of those three made an impact in the locker room since arriving and on the field against James Madison with George Campbell catching a touchdown, Reuben Jones recording a pair of sacks and Josh Growden punting eight times.

4—Teachable moments. West Virginia hadn’t experienced any adversity since Brown took over but that’s exactly what they got a helping off in the first half against James Madison. The Mountaineers trailed 7-3 entering the break but the young group didn’t panic and was able to bounce back to seize control of the game on the backs of good defensive and special teams efforts. It’s always easier to teach off a win and a positive to start off on the right note but the response from the team was critical.

It certainly wasn’t pretty as offensively there wasn’t a lot of positives outside of not turning the ball over and there was a general lack of physicality across the board. Miscues, such as five procedure penalties, stuck out along with drops, six of those, but the team as a whole battled through to get the only thing that matters a win in that situation. The Mountaineers found out a little itself after this game and of course is going to find out a lot more this weekend but still the program did what it needed to do.

5—No pads in warm ups. West Virginia isn’t using pads in warm ups and there is a reason for that. No, it isn’t about trying to keep who’s playing where a secret or for any coaching advantage. It’s actually something that pre-dates Brown’s time in Morgantown altogether.

Brown started doing that in 2016 at Troy in large part because the players were losing a lot of water weight during warm ups. But eventually the players liked it enough that it kept them feeling fresh so when he arrived at West Virginia he presented the idea to his players. Obviously the weather isn’t a factor as much in Morgantown but it is a way to keep the players fresh overall. The quarterbacks and long snappers are the only exception due to the motions required but it essentially comes down to providing the players with you could call a psychological advantage before games.

----------

• Talk about it with West Virginia fans on The Blue Lot.

• SUBSCRIBE today to stay up on the latest on Mountaineer sports and recruiting.

• Get all of our WVU videos on YouTube by subscribing to the WVSports.com Channel

• Follow us on Twitter: @WVSportsDotCom, @rivalskeenan, @PatrickKotnik

•Like us on Facebook