BREAKING: West Virginia Fires Head Coach Neal Brown
West Virginia University athletics director Wren Baker has made the decision to fire head football coach Neal Brown, according to Matt Zenitz of CBS Sports.
Brown will finish with a 37-35 record over six years on the job, including a conference record of 25-28. Heading into Saturday's game at Texas Tech, it felt like there was still a chance of this happening, but last week's win over UCF created a lot of uncertainty on the outside. A 52-15 loss to Texas Tech wasn't the deciding factor for Baker and Co., but it certainly put the exclamation mark to what was a disappointing season and tenure.
West Virginia went 3-17 over his six years against AP Top 25 opponents and never reached the top 25 themselves. Not once. The three ranked teams West Virginia beat - Kansas State, Virginia Tech, and Iowa State - each finished their season outside of the top 25. Kansas State (2020) and Virginia Tech (2021) actually ended their respective seasons with a losing record.
The Mountaineers never secured a signature win on Brown's watch and essentially remained an average football team since 2020. WVU beat the teams they should have beaten and lost the games they weren't favored in. This year is a prime example of that. All five of the Power Four teams they beat had losing records - Kansas 5-7, Oklahoma State 3-9, Arizona 4-8, Cincinnati 5-7, and UCF 4-8. All six of the games they lost were teams that finished the regular season with a winning record - Penn State 11-1, Pitt 7-5, Iowa State 10-2, Kansas State 8-4, Baylor 8-4, and Texas Tech 8-4.
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Initial Thoughts: The One Thing Neal Brown Couldn't Have Happen, Happened