If anything is true about the West Virginia backfield, it’s that change has been constant.
The Mountaineers have dealt with various injuries in the running back room this season and were dealt another blow with news that freshman CJ Donaldson is out for the year. That is on top of starter Tony Mathis trying to work his way back after missing the TCU game and Justin Johnson also banged up.
Depending on what happens with Mathis this week, the Mountaineers could be down to just Johnson, redshirt freshman Jaylen Anderson and walk-on Markquon Rucker.
Regardless of who gets the start, the Mountaineers are going to enter with the same plan. It won’t change depending on who is available and will be built around the best opportunity to win.
“You got to try to put together the best plan you can put together and trust your guys to go do it,” offensive coordinator Graham Harrell said.
Anderson is likely going to be called upon for a larger role regardless, while Johnson could in line to start the game if Mathis can’t go after leaving the Texas Tech game early with an injury. Anderson had 3 carries for 6 yards, while adding a 15-yard reception when called upon against the Horned Frogs.
“I thought in that situation in the fourth quarter against a top ten opponent I thought he carried himself just fine,” head coach Neal Brown said. “The expectation is that he will be better this week after having some experience.”
One thing that the coaches will be dealing with is the fact that there just isn’t any other options outside of what has already been mentioned. That means being creative in how the coaches utilize those carries.
“We have to be creative too to create some carries. That’s what we’ll do but it rolls on,” Brown said. “I wish we had CJ; I wish we had Tony but we ran the ball well but we’ve also ran the ball regardless of who’s been back there. So, if it’s Jaylen, JJ or Rucker whoever it is the expectation is we have to block and they have to make the right read and break some tackles.”
As part of that creativity the coaches could look at short passes to get the ball in space to options as well as the screen game. The coaching staff also could look for ways to get quarterback Garrett Greene involved with passes or designed runs in a variety of different ways.
While Greene remains a quarterback long term, what he does bring to the table is the ability to do some things with the ball in his hands to help alleviate the stress on the backfield.
“He is versatile. He’s a good athlete and he’s one of those guys it doesn’t matter what you’re playing he has a pretty good skill set,” Brown said.
Harrell agrees that expanding the role of Greene should help.
“He’s a guy that we can continue to grow packages with and put him in different spots and dress it up because he is pretty good with the football in his hands. Continue to get him touches,” he said.
The Mountaineers must be able to run the football against Iowa State to have success and the coaching staff might have to get creative in finding ways to do it depending on the availability of the room.
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