Neal Brown is a firm believer that a football team makes its biggest strides from the first scrimmage of the fall to the second.

That makes this week a very important one for West Virginia.

“This week we have to make our biggest improvement,” he said.

The Mountaineers held their first scrimmage Saturday with some mixed results across the board but since then the head coach has been impressed with the way his team has approached practice. The players got some valuable team reps Monday and followed that up with another productive performance Wednesday with a mandated off-day sandwiched in-between.

Speed work will be the focus Thursday before the program moves into the second scrimmage under the lights Friday night which could be significant in determining certain spots.

“It will decide kind of who we’re going to play with and who we’re not going to play with,” he said.

The coaches plan to sit down and go from position room to position room following the scrimmage in order to see which players are going to be in the mix. That will be judged off the thoughts from the position coaches, Brown himself and the production grades. The Mountaineers will determine starters, what the travel roster could look like and the plan for potential redshirt player that will play this fall.

The quarterback spot is no different as Brown hopes to at least have a good idea of who could win the battle for the job. That position will be broken down into segments and the live work this week should help the coaches to hopefully navigate a winner.

To date each of the options have gone some positive things especially throwing the ball down the field but have struggled underneath and with taking sacks as well as turnovers. Essentially those mistakes that will get teams beat from the quarterback spot.

On the defensive side, Brown is starting to feel comfortable with the defensive line two-deep and believes the unit continues to improve.

“System wise the system they’re running right now fits them. It’s a little bit of an undersized group so we’re moving them,” Brown said.

As for other spots, Brown feels good about the first team at linebacker and the second team has started to develop while the older cornerbacks have played well they just need the younger ones to step up. At safety it will be important to get as much experience as possible there.

There has been some ebb and flow between the offense and defense which is what the coaches wants at this stage between the two units but the message is clear cut. West Virginia has to be better at running the football offensively and has to do a better job keeping the ball in front of them on defense.

Health wise the team also is in a good spot with no major injuries to date.

Next Wednesday represents the cut off for fall camp with players given off the first day of school. Monday is set to be a good practice while Tuesday will serve as a special team’s day with younger players getting reps in other areas.

West Virginia will being prep work for James Madison Thursday and then will participate in a mock game Aug. 24 before moving into actual game week.

There's a lot of decisions to be made and not a lot of time to do it.

West Virginia fans we're offering our best promo to get all the coverage you need!

Sign up for a new annual subscription to WVSports.com at 25-percent off the normal cost and you'll get a $75 eCard to the Adidas Store and we'll throw in THREE EXTRA MONTHS FREE! rvls.co/2GIpcqX

----------

• 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