Neal Brown Discusses the Good and the Bad from Week 1

WVU HC Neal Brown gives his final thoughts and points out the positive and negative from the win over Eastern Kentucky

The Mountaineers are coming off a lopsided 56-10 win over Eastern Kentucky on Saturday. This week, they get a bye before opening their Big 12 Conference schedule on the road against Oklahoma State on Saturday, September 26th.

The good most certainly outweighed the bad on Saturday, but there were mistakes made in all three phases of the game on Saturday. As he does every week during the season and after watching the film, Brown went over both the positives and negatives of Saturday’s game.

WVU head coach Neal Brown prowling the sidelines as the Mountaineers defeated Eastern Kentucky 56-10 / Ben Queen - WVU Football

DEFENSE

Negative

“There were three explosive pass plays, and then we had two missed takeaway opportunities. One of them glanced off our hands, and one of them we had a missed assignment where we should have been right there waiting on the ball. And we got to do a better job of getting all 11 guys to the football. I thought we pursued okay, but in our league with the explosiveness that we’re going to play, we’ve got to a better job of getting hats to the ball.”

Positive

“Very few missed assignments, and we played a lot of people. Eastern was 1-11 on third down, which was impressive. 2.3 yards per rush and then four sacks and nine TFL’s. 13 of the 49 plays were negative plays, so that was a job well done defensively.”

OFFENSE

Negative

“Perimeter blocking – we’ve got to make some strides there. I thought the details in our routes were just OK – we’ve got to be better than that. And then, I was really disappointed in the second half. We missed on a fourth and short, and we weren’t able to convert in the red zone and which has been a point of emphasis for us, especially in the red zone. We were not able to do that and missed a chip shot.”

Positive

“Zero turnovers in 86 countable snaps. 329 rushing yards, which has been, as you know, something we’ve really focused on. And we started fast, which is – took the ball coming out, and that was by design, and we started fast, and we wanted to get ahead, and we were able to do that.”

SPECIAL TEAMS

Negative

“Special teams, without a doubt, the most disappointing part of Saturday afternoon. Penalties, we don’t want to ever be in a situation where West Virginia beats West Virginia, and we were better than Eastern, so it didn’t hurt us, but we cannot get into Big 12 play and have that many penalties. That’s six flags – six penalties. We had more flags than that but only six penalties that were accepted on special teams.

“The kickoff cover team, which has been a strength all through last year and really did a nice job other than one. Thankfully, it was a penalty that called it back, but they returned one on us for a touchdown, and we just had about four guys that didn’t do what they were coached to do on that. And our Field goal protection wasn’t good enough, and we missed a 25-yard field goal. We got to be better than that.”

Positive

“We downed the punt inside the one, which is something we put a lot of work into and we won the field position battle, and even with all the negative plays we had on special teams, we still won the field position battle, so that was good.”

Neal Brown also added that “This is a week that’s not like a typical bye week… We’ve got to continue to make improvement. We’re going to have more camp-style practices than bye week practices. A lot of good on good work this week.”

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