What We Learned: WVU’s win over Kansas

As some in the fan base and the media were predicting, yesterday’s Kansas-West Virginia game proved to be the closest contest the two had played since 2013, when the Jayhawks upset the Mountaineers in Lawrence. West Virginia did just enough to escape the Sunflower State with a 29-24 victory and head into the bye week 3-1, as they prepare for the Texas Longhorns on homecoming. What we learned overall from the game is that the Mountaineers have a lot of work to do if they’re going to compete toe-to-toe with their next three opponents, but here are a few takeaways:

Austin Kendall is still not in sync with his receiving core:

If all Austin Kendall is tasked to do is throw six-yard arrow routes in the flat or bubble screens then, West Virginia would have itself one of the best passers in school history. But outside of that, Kendall really couldn’t get much of anything going downfield in this game. Fans let out a sigh of relief when an interception he overthrew to TJ Simmons was called incomplete because the ball’s tip touched the turf. Kendall once again overthrew a go route down the sideline, and another pass that was surely destined for a first down was thrown low and behind a receiver. Kendall does deserve some credit for being more assertive and running the ball himself when he has room, but aside from the passing inaccuracies, he struggled in this game to make the determinations to either pass or throw the ball away when there was a rush. He took a few bad sacks that stalled drives. Kendall’s talent is there, but he’s still not in command of this offense. Does anyone else think he simply looks uncomfortable for some reason?

Undefined roles in the red zone leads to confusion:

For the last two years, everyone knew to look for Will Grier to hit David Sills on a slant or a jump ball in the red zone for a touchdown. Everyone on the offense had his role to play when the Mountaineers saw pay dirt in sight. This year, with so many interchanging parts on offense, Neal Brown’s still working out what he should do with which players to score from short yardage. Against Kansas in the red zone, West Virginia didn’t know what to run and whatever Brown tried didn’t seem to work for whatever reason. As players’ strengths start to show, Brown will have some bread and butter plays to go to that will lead to touchdowns. In this game, simply, West Virginia had to settle for field goals. Despite missing his first attempt, Evan Staley may have been the MVP of this game for coming through with 12 points in field goals. Against better opponents, West Virginia will have to score six instead of three more times than it did against Kansas, if it wants to win games against quality opponents. That starts with developing continuity in the red zone.

The four-headed running back monster is ready to rumble:

Leddie Brown averaged nearly six yards per carry and cut through Kansas’s defense like cavalry through infantry. Kennedy McKoy showed he is maximizing on his potential as a feature all-purpose back, rushing for 73 yards on 20 carries with a touchdown and catching five balls for 44 yards. Quite possibly the other MVP in this game was Martell Pettaway, who scored two touchdowns with 40 yards on six carries to his credit, after not receiving a carry against NC State. The touchdown he scored, while spinning out of a pile of tacklers was a thing of beauty. Though he didn’t play much of a factor in this game, Alec Sinkfield is still a factor on special teams and spells the other three effectively. If the offensive line can continue to show improvement little-by-little each week, West Virginia has the horses to run 48 times a game like it did in this game.

The linebackers still need work:

Like last year, it was great to see that West Virginia could contain Khalil Herbert and Pooka Williams Jr. But, West Virginia’s linebackers still struggled with one-on-one tackling a mobile quarterback. Kansas quarterback Carter Stanley took a page out of James Madison’s Ben DiNucci’s playbook and every time he was able to avoid the initial rush, he was able to put a West Virginia linebacker on an island and breeze past him for a first down. We’re not talking about Sam Ehlinger, Brock Purdy or Jalen Hurts here. The defensive line is getting pressure consistently, but has struggled at times with finishing with sacks, and instead, the quarterback evades the pressure and is able to escape for a frustrating first down by skating past a linebacker. This should improve with Vandarius Cowan coming back, but it’s going to take a concerted effort from the linebackers to step up and get the quarterback to the ground.

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