West Virginia closed the season the right away by rallying in the second half to beat Army 24-21 in the 62nd Liberty Bowl. It was the first bowl win for the Mountaineers since 2016 and only the second as a member of the Big 12 Conference.
With the bowl win the Mountaineers finish the season at 6-4 and WVSports.com takes a look back at what unfolded in our weekly feature The Day After.
HOT:
Austin Kendall. The game played out just like we all predicted it would with the redshirt senior leading the Mountaineers to a second-half comeback over a scrappy Army team. Of course I'm being facetious, but a lot of credit goes to Kendall who had played only 24 snaps on the season before being put in to quarterback the game in the second half. The former Oklahoma transfer would lead West Virginia to a pair of touchdown drives and more importantly a win throwing for 121 yards and a pair of scores. It speaks a lot to the character of Kendall that despite losing the starting job he held most of last year to Jarret Doege at the start of this season, he was ready when called upon. It certainly wasn't a perfect game but it didn't need to be. Kendall made just enough plays and undeniably gave the offense a major spark when it needed it the most. He was more decisive and displayed a better overall command of the offense when he was taking snaps. Credit Brown for making the decision to go to Kendall when he did because it worked and got them a win. West Virginia doesn't win this game without Kendall coming into the game and who would have thought that before it kicked off?
The West Virginia defense. A lot of credit goes out to both the players on the field and the coaching staff for putting in a good game plan in a short period of time against the difficult Army offensive attack. The Black Knights rolled up 149 of their 239 total yards on two drives but managed only 90 on the other 9. The defense was even put in a bad spot on a turnover with a short field but still yielded only 21 points in this one. What makes this even more impressive is that some of the key players on defense either didn't play or had very limited roles. West Virginia was essentially without their leading tackler Tony Fields, arguably one of their best players in Tykee Smith, top reserve linebacker Exree Loe and several others that got dinged up during the game such as Sean Mahone and still put together a strong effort.
