He wanted his assistants while he was still furious
He did not wait until Sunday morning. Rich Rodriguez pulled his staff into a room minutes after Saturday night’s final whistle, still simmering.
“It was one of the first times in my career that I held a staff meeting right after a game,” the West Virginia head coach said on Monday. “I wanted to get them while I was still angry.”
His team had just won. Mountaineers 31, Coastal Carolina 24, in the home opener. The scoreline buries what actually happened: West Virginia were up 24-0 at the break and produced next to nothing after it.
Rodriguez is not hunting for excuses. He says he turned too conservative with his play-calling once the lead was built. “We know what we did wrong. A lot of it was avoidable. The problem was discipline.”
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373 passing yards given up by a team leading by 24
The defensive tally is ugly. 425 total yards allowed, 373 of them through the air.
“We had bad eyes more than bad angles,” Rodriguez said. “There were two or three times where we adjusted our coverage poorly, with bad eye discipline.”
Then came the injury news. Defensive lineman Darius Wiley is out for the season with a right knee injury suffered in the fourth quarter.
The offense gave him something to smile about. Michael Hawkins Jr racked up 235 yards in his Mountaineers debut, 132 through the air with a touchdown and 103 on the ground with another. Cam Cook carried 30 times for 142 yards and two scores.
UT Martin have not thrown a touchdown pass yet
Next up is UT Martin, an FCS program at 1-1 after a 42-7 win over Chicago State. Every one of those six touchdowns came on the ground, on 216 rushing yards. Tommy Ansley took three of them and finished with 106 yards on 16 carries. Chris Franklin added two more.
“We’ve got a really good offensive line, so we leaned on those guys,” Skyhawks coach Jason Simpson said. “We’re still a work in progress.” Quarterback Tate Surber, making his college debut, went 16 of 23 for 222 yards and an interception.
The two programs have never played each other. Morgantown opens a four-game road stretch for the Skyhawks.
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