Week 11: WVU Football and Hot Pockets

Dear BFA’s,

November 3, 2012; Morgantown, WV, USA; General view of Mountaineer Field as the West Virginia Mountaineers host the TCU Horned Frogs during the second quarter at Milan Puskar Field. The TCU Horned Frogs won 39-38 in two overtimes. Mandatory Credit: Charles LeClaire-US PRESSWIRE

Disheartening is the word that comes to mind. We played so much better this week, but were still let down in the end by what is a lack of extremely simple fundamentals. There is no way in hell, outside of having Marquise Lee going up against a high school corner back from a divsion A school in WV, that TCU’s last touchdown in regulation should have happened. There is no way that you let somebody by the safety, or get 20 yards behind him. Shameful. What is truly shitty about the loss is that it was actually fun to watch for a change. I for one definitely enjoy watching a few defense stops, so the mock roars that rose up on the first few defense stops were some what invigorating. Surprisingly there were more than just a few stops . . . on the other side the coin, the offense is playing like they have packed it in for the season. I hate to say this, but it comes across to me that we had a lot of guys that loved the hype, but when the going got tough, they got soft.

I waited an extra few days before typing the above, and had some booze to shake it off, but there is no way to put it pretty. We should have won that game. Now we are worried about them not collapsing completely with a tough schedule still remaining. The defense definitely played a better and more complete game, albeit against one of the worst offenses in Big XII, but some things simply come down to coaching.

The question moving forward will be whether the fans jump ship or not. I certainly will still be there, but I’d be lying if I said I would be tuned up for each game in the same manner as I was earlier. For nothing more than my own sanity, I’ll have to have a light hearted approach headed into game to survive, which probably means you should stop by the tailgate for festivities.

But screw it. Morgantown is a fun place for a game and so isn’t Mountaineer field. The next game at home is against Oklahoma and we will have a Gold Rush. Lets let the legend of Barry Switzer know how we like to party; all moonshined up, eating squirrel gravy and biscuits, and ingesting beer through various amounts of funnel devices. We shall walk into the halls of Mylan Puskar ready to shake the walls with a rebel yell. We shall not contribute to the beer sales cause we gotz the booze with us, secretly concealed. I suggest going old school on this #$!@*, cause what else we gonna do? As a famous leader once said, “We gonna do sumptin”.

Tough game to handicap this weekend with the way we have been playing and mirror image of style of play. Holgo goes up against his former boss in Stillwater; who is now well past being 40. I don’t see a victory in the cards, but the Pokes have been inconsistent all year. They have put up a lot of points, but sit in a very similar spot as us at 5-3, having given up just as many points as they’ve scored. One thing is for sure, we will have to fix our busted flat on offense to have a shot this week.

Around the Nation

We entered last weekend with six undefeated teams and we left the weekend the same way. The top four, or the meaningful four that actually have a shot at the championship, all had legitimate shots to lose this weekend, but they all survived and are moving on. We could arguably say that each of these teams are past their largest hurdles and for a few of them, we look at how the schedule plays out and cannot see where they are going to lose. Are we going to have a four way gridlock with K state, Notre Dame, Bama, and Oregon? I doubt it. Typically as soon as we are resigned that we are going to have multiple undefeated teams, some one losing to an Iowa State. The Quack has Cal this weekend, Notre Dame has Boston College, and K state has TCU, which mostly look like gimmies except for the last one being a somewhat challenge, but who knows? Bama has to face the high flying Kevin Sumlin act, which is the best offense they have had to play all year. Lets be clear that Texas AM is definitely not as good as Bama and likely see its spread attack struggle, but give them a chance at hanging in. It certainly would baptize the Aggies in the SEC world if the first year team were the ones to knock off the leagues top NC contender.

The fun part of this time of season is buying into the hype and drama of having numerous undefeated teams, but still think that we have a slim chance of being there at year’s end, but if we do, what a good way to begin sending out the BCS with only two more postseason’s left.

Speaking of Kevin Sumlin, uh yea, this is weird.

Stopping into the ACC, which we rightfully rarely talk about as they define mediocrity, has a legit chance of having either Miami or Duke in its conference championship game. Between the two of them, they have suffered 5 losses by thirty points or more. Yep, they are so much better than the Big East.

The Big Ten now has two teams ranked in the Coaches poll. Sad Face. Nebraska and Northwestern each have tough games this weekend as the Cornhuskers play the boy touchers (awkward) and NW takes on Big Blue. Hopefully by weekend’s end they no longer have a ranked representative!

Really it is not a great weekend slate and unfortunately there is a major block of good games in the 330 slot, right when the Mountaineers are on. Such is life some times and why you need multiple tvs. If this week has confirmed one thing though, watching bad football is better than watching good politics (and regardless of your voting preference, that was some drama watching them maps flipping around Tuesday).

Random

The Pirate has had a rough year in Washington and it is showing.

Finally. Finally the EA games sports game predictor has picked the Mountaineer’s to win. It was this damn machine that originally sent us into this tailspin. Great quote: “On a completely unrelated matchup note, I imagine a night out with Dana Holgorsen, Mike Gundy and about 50 or so beers would probably end up exactly how you think it would.

AWESOME.

I respect this man. If you are going to go down for stealing, it might as well be for stealing beer. There is nothing wrong with that. Now if he had stolen the orange camo Keystone cans, the cameras would have probably never seen him.

It was just terrible watching the Chokies choke it all away last night wasn’t it? While it has been tough watching the Irish and Buckeyes all year, the Hokies have made up for it by being quite awful with their over hyped superstar quarterback.

These hurricane Sandy folks are getting free Hot Pockets!! I think that is more than a fair trade off.

Sincerely,

Sleepless in Charleston