Observations: West Virginia football at TCU
Each week WVSports.com Managing Editor Keenan Cummings provides a look at some of the things that stood out to him during the course of the game and on the stat sheet.
These observations are a snap shot of what unfolded in the West Virginia 29-17 win at TCU and what could happen next for the Mountaineers.
--West Virginia last won on the road Nov. 29, 2019, at TCU and the streak is finally over as the Mountaineers again were able to topple the Horned Frogs in Forth Worth. This program desperately need this type of performance coming out of the bye and they delivered in a major way. Credit head coach Neal Brown for having this team ready to play and after a nightmare start with the kickoff return for a touchdown, this team controlled this game for basically the remainder of the game. I’ve been critical of the talking about improving instead of it actually happening, but this game is a reflection of why I’ve yet to panic about this team and the direction of this program. Brown basically admitted this team was beat up both physically and mentally and the fact they were able to rebound on the road with their backs against the wall and win this football game is impressive fashion is a nice steppingstone for the rest of the season. This was an inspired football team and I felt that was going to go a long way toward determining the rest of this season. I’m not going to sit here and pretend that TCU is a great football team but neither was Texas Tech or Maryland and the Mountaineers couldn’t beat them either. This game not only gets the proverbial monkey off the back on the road and in the Big 12 but gives some real life moving forward with five games left on the schedule. I’ve been under the belief that West Virginia could win or lose any of these six games depending on which team shows up but if it’s this one I think it could be some interesting football down the stretch. Three more wins gets you in a bowl game and after the way the Baylor game ended who thought we’d be talking about that?
--West Virginia needed to run the football in this game and that they did. The 229 rushing yards are the most on the season and the second most under Brown. It’s the most against an FBS team, which is something that they made a point during the bye week. Senior Leddie Brown was very good in this one with 111 yards and 3 scores. The senior had three runs over 10+ yards which is only four short of the 7 that he had coming into this game for the entire year. The 24-yard run toward the end of the game was the type of play that we’ve come to expect out of him. Also think it deserves mentioning that redshirt sophomore Tony Mathis really ran the ball hard in this game. He finished with 12 carries for 48 yards and looks like he is ready to take over that backup running back role.
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