WVU looks to run often on Pirates
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (AP) – West Virginia hasn’t had any trouble getting its ground game revved up. Not this season. And never, it seems, against East Carolina. First-year Pirates coach Skip Holtz is getting ready for another onslaught when East Carolina (1-1) plays at West Virginia (3-0) on Saturday.
East Carolina surrendered 407 rushing yards last week in a 44-34 loss at Wake Forest, the Demon Deacons’ best performance in 24 years. But that pales to the 458 yards West Virginia has averaged over the past three seasons against the Pirates.
The Mountaineers set a Big East record with 536 rushing yards in 2002. Two years later, East Carolina couldn’t stop Kay-Jay Harris, who set a conference mark with 337 yards.
Harris is gone. So is mobile quarterback Rasheed Marshall. Yet West Virginia still runs well, ranking seventh in Division I-A with nearly 271 yards per game.
West Virginia freshman Jason Gwaltney attended last year’s ECU game during a recruiting visit and remembered talking to Harris afterward.
“‘That could be you in the next couple of years,”‘ Gwaltney recalled Harris saying.
“He definitely tore it up that day, and all of us are looking to do the same thing as a unit,” Gwaltney said.
Unlike past seasons, no single WVU rusher has been dominant so far.
Four different players have accumulated 100 yards in three games. Eight players have seven carries or more. In two of the games, West Virginia ran the ball 64 times.
Last year’s top returnee, Jason Colson, actually has 10 fewer yards than walk-on transfer Owen Schmitt, who had a team-high 87 yards in last Saturday’s 31-19 win over Maryland.
“I think it’s a big bonus for us to be able to play four, five running backs because having fresh legs and playing two at a time and doing all the things our running backs have to do, they can get pretty gassed,” said West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez.
To Holtz, watching the Mountaineers on film is a blur – and a headache.
“They have three tailbacks that have an awful lot of speed, athleticism and explosiveness. And two of the three are physical. They’re big and they’re strong,” Holtz said. “And I think their fullback, Owen Schmitt, he tries to hurt people.”
Pile on to that West Virginia’s two-quarterback system of Adam Bednarik and Pat White. The pair are 1-2 in team rushing so far. Bednarik suffered a neck stinger when a teammate landed on him during a run against Maryland but is expected to play Saturday.
Holtz this week challenged his defense to play better. The Pirates rank 11th in rushing defense among the 12 Conference USA teams.
A decent performance against West Virginia could enable ECU’s offense to keep pace against a Mountaineer team that let a 15-point lead against Maryland dwindle to 21-19 midway through the fourth quarter.
East Carolina has the weapons to do it, too. James Pinkney threw for 292 yards and three touchdowns against Wake Forest. Aundrae Allison had eight catches for 158 yards and two scores. Chris Johnson ran for 102 yards and a TD.
It appears the Pirates’ best chance is through the air.
“They’re only giving up 1.5 yards a carry on defense,” Holtz said of WVU.
“When you start looking at those kind of numbers, normally you look at their schedule and say they hadn’t played anybody, but they played Syracuse and Maryland.
“We’re definitely taking it a step up. This is our third BCS conference school in a row that we’re playing. It will be a great challenge for us, especially playing them there with the crowd noise.”
The game is a sellout, the fifth in Morgantown since 2001.