Depressing Takeaways From WVU Football's Blowout Road Loss To UCF Knights

Another week, another atrocious loss for WVU football in the first year of Rich Rodriguez's second tenure with the program.

WVU traveled to Orlando for a battle between winless Big 12 teams against UCF, and didn't even come close to getting that first conference win. The Knights took the West Virginia Mountaineers behind the proverbial woodshed and whipped Rodriguez's team like a government mule in a 45-13 win – UCF's first-ever win against West Virginia. Here are the relatively depressing takeaways from another loss as we count the days to basketball season.

Nothing Was Fixed During Bye Week

Usually, you hope that your team manages to use a bye week to get some of the issues that have been plaguing them worked out. That clearly did not seem to happen for the Mountaineers.

WVU brought out a team that looked like nothing had been adjusted or fixed during the bye week. They actually managed to look a whole hell of a lot worse against a UCF team that was also winless in Big 12 play before Saturday’s game than they did two weeks prior against a Top 25 opponent in BYU.

The offensive line still struggled (more on that in a minute), neither of the young quarterbacks looked as if they had developed any further, and the defense still gave up too many gaps. Your MVP was arguably punter Ollie Straw, who pinned UCF inside their own five-yard line twice and converted a fake punt for a first down – that then resulted in a missed field goal. When your punter is your best player, you’ve got a real problem.

Coaching Staff Too Stubborn To Make Offensive Line Changes

You’d think that after you had seen multiple backups come in during various points in various games and outperform your starters, you’d make a change at that position. Especially when that position has been as large a liability as WVU’s offensive line.

But despite Rodriguez saying weeks ago that backups were going to play more, the Mountaineers have continued to roll out the same starting lineup that has continued to get absolutely embarrassed and look like one of the worst units in the country. Even when backup tackle Malik Agbo came into the game and quarterback Khalil Wilkins earned his first score with him leading the way, starter Ty’Kieast Crawford was immediately back in on the next drive.WVU football will continue to lose until changes are made in the trenches.

What’s Left To Be Said? This Team Is Bad

What more can be said about the state of this West Virginia football? Even at his worst, during his first season with WVU in his first stint that ended with a 3-8 record, Rodriguez managed to put up 80 points in one game against Rutgers. The Mountaineers have scored just 148 points through seven games this season – and once it's all said and done, they might not manage three wins.

There’s not much of a doubt that most teams led by former head coach Neal Brown, who was fired last season, could easily handle the 2025 edition of the Mountaineers. This is probably the worst team in the Big 12 – they've given up 38 or more points in every conference game. If WVU isn't the worst team in the league, it's only because Oklahoma State was bad enough to get a legendary head coach fired after three games.

Maybe it's not time to give up on the Rich Rodriguez experiment. It's hard to win with a completely rebuilt roster, and Deion Sanders went from 4-8 in year one to 9-4 in year two with a similar situation at Colorado recently. Not to mention, how hard the injury bug has hit WVU has to be acknowledged, at the very least. But after the first bye week was followed by another absolute beating for a fourth straight loss, it's probably time to sell any remaining stock you had in WVU salvaging this season or making a bowl game – maybe even sell the stock you had in them winning another game at all.