Before each game West Virginia defensive coordinator Tony Gibson maps out a check list to his group on what they’ll need to do in order to come out with a win.
The usual culprits can typically be found on it such as turnovers, stops in the red zone, tackling and controlling the run game. But there was only one ahead of the Iowa State game.
“Play hard,” Gibson said.
And that they did.
On a week where the coaching staff openly challenged the toughness of the Mountaineers the defense rose to the challenge holding the Cyclones to 16-points and 350 yards. The point total is the lowest amount that West Virginia has allowed against a power five opponent this season. In each of the previous attempted the defense had yielded at least 31-points to power five opposition.
Impressive, but perhaps even more so is the fact that Gibson was operating with a patch-work unit that was missing four starters along with several key reserves and still managed to hold the Cyclones to only 101 rushing yards.
Effort, strain and intensity were the battle cries of the defense throughout the week leading up to the game and on the field the Mountaineers rallied to the football and played with a different level of intensity than they had through the first seven games of the season.
All of that with a number of freshmen or first-year players on the field in critical situations. And each of those replacement players had a significant impact at some point in the game.
The Mountaineers also were stout in the red zone holding the Cyclones inside the ten-yard line twice, including two straight carries inside the two-yard line to force a field goal in the third quarter.
“That was when the moment swung back to us,” Gibson said.
It was the culmination of a week-long exercise in physicality as West Virginia altered its standard practice routine on Tuesdays by scrapping the typical teaching day with spider pads to full uppers. That meant more contact as a way to help develop an edge across the board.
That resulted in players going at it on the practice field reminiscent to something you’d see play out during fall camp. It was a matter of reestablishing the physical brand that had been a trademark of West Virginia not only on defense, but throughout the team.
It worked.
“We came in and got tired of being told how soft we are and we can’t stop the run and play tough,” redshirt senior linebacker Al-Rasheed Benton said.
The West Virginia coaching staff didn’t hide the fact that this was an important game for the program as head coach Dana Holgorsen said they didn’t hold back on stressing the significance.
After losing in all three opportunities to upset a ranked team, the Mountaineers didn’t let this one slip through their fingers. It’s the first such win against a top 15 opponent since Baylor in 2014.
“I was proud of our guys for how they responded when I called them out,” Holgorsen said.
And it wouldn’t have been possible without the play of Gibson’s unit.
Could it be a watershed moment for a defense that was ranked 115th coming into the game? That remains to be seen, but it was certainly a building block moving forward.
“Some of these puppies are starting to turn into dawgs,” Gibson said in reference to his mantra defense always wins games.
