The West Virginia football program has addressed a pressing need on the offensive front with a commitment from Tulsa offensive line transfer Walter Young Bear.
Young Bear, 6-foot-3, 319-pounds, committed to the Mountaineers over offers from Pittsburgh, North Carolina, Virginia, California, UCF, Liberty and Stanford, among others.
Young Bear started 12 games in 2024 and has played over 1,000 snaps on the offensive line in his career with the biggest bulk coming this past season with 874.
The Mountaineers jumped into the recruitment of Young Bear on Dec. 3 with a scholarship offer and were able to secure his pledge after a visit to campus.
Young Bear, an Oklahoma native, is the first commitment for West Virginia out of the transfer portal along the offensive line which will effectively be losing their top six players from this past season due to graduation and the transfer portal. He has one season of eligibility remaining in his career.
WVSports.com breaks down the transfer commitment of Young Bear and what it means to the West Virginia football program both now and in the future.
The data:
Young Bear started all 12 games for Tulsa this past season and recorded 874 snaps in the process. That makes up for a large chunk of the 1,116 snaps that he has played on the offensive line during his career. Young Bear was in the rotation in 2023, but didn’t emerge as a starter until the final two games of the year.
While he has played offensive tackle in his career, Young Bear emerged as a starter at left guard. He graded out at 63.3 overall according to Pro Football Focus, the second highest mark on his team along the offensive line for those that played over 200 snaps. He was effective in pass blocking with a grade of 71.9 across 508 snaps, while he was at 59.7 in 366 snaps as a run blocker.
Fitting the program:
Young Bear is a player who brings starting experience at Tulsa to Morgantown and helps to fill a need on the interior of the offensive line with the departure of Tomas Rimac to the transfer portal. The Mountaineers have 12 other scholarship offensive linemen on the roster outside of Young Bear but a total of seven of those are either redshirt or true freshmen. That makes adding experience a necessity and Young Bear brings that.
There will be an opportunity for him to slide in as a starter from the jump with the Mountaineers and because of his previous experience, he automatically becomes one of, if not the, most seasoned option up front.
Offensive line is one of the most difficult positions to address in the transfer market but the addition of Young Bear is a welcomed one for a unit that is going through plenty of changes from a year ago.
Recruiting the position:
West Virginia is in the midst of almost a complete rebuild along the offensive line with all six of the top players in terms of snaps played exiting the program this off-season. That makes finding capable options to fill in a priority and Young Bear certainly helps on that front.
The Mountaineers are going to need more here in order to round out the roster in terms of experience, but the program has added an experienced piece to the interior.
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