What does preparation look like at West Virginia when football does return?

But the one question that practically everybody is focusing on when football does return is just how long will it take from a strength and conditioning perspective to have the players ready for the season?

Short answer there is no set timeline but ballpark it should realistically be around four to six weeks according to West Virginia head coach Neal Brown. That certainly isn’t anywhere close to being set in stone but it’s something that officials have discussed in regards to a return.

“Your big guys really have to get in position where they can have strength and be able to impact and things like that. Your skill guys have got to get in more cardio and be able to have short bursts and things like that,” Brown said.

Preparation for the season has become essentially an eight-week summer and strength and conditioning program in order to condense the fall camp down to 25-practices.

This has been something that colleges have worked towards over the years going away from the old model of players going home for the summer and returning to a longer fall camp in order to get prepared for the season.

With so much uncertainty regarding a date for when football will resume, it’s hard to predict how things will unfold with preparation in light of the COVID-19 pandemic but safety will be at the forefront when it comes to readying for the season. If not, you run into risks with soft tissue injuries and more.

But could it have an effect on the product at the start of the season?

The loss of spring football, with West Virginia only getting in two sessions, some places getting in zero and others in between can affect the timing and repetition. And even if you make the bold assumption that every player is doing what they are supposed to do with working out, eating and sleeping well and preparing for the season you can still have negative effects.

“You can’t make up the timing of the play that you get in the spring, the repetitions that you log and even without coaches the stuff that the kids can do on their own in the summer,” Brown said. “You can’t get those back.”

What could that mean?

Well, it could make the product not as clean early in the season and you’ll probably see more programs being basic because they don’t have the time to teach and rep the things that they normally would during an off-season. It might not be noticeable to the average fan, but it could be apparent.

Still with so many questions, just getting football back would be a welcomed change and for now we wait for word on when that can occur.

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