WVU football is hoping to get off to a strong start under Rich Rodriguez's second stint with the program. After six seasons of average football under Neal Brown, the Mountaineers would like to return to the prominence that accompanied Rodriguez's first tenure in Morgantown.
But according to the Kelley Ford Ratings, West Virginia might want to tamper their hopes for success in 2025. The prominent college football power ranking website released their Projected Big 12 Standings based upon their current ratings, and WVU football came in dead last in that projection.
Projected Big 12 Standings v1 pic.twitter.com/vfzfYwSJmK
— Kelley Ford (@KFordRatings) June 17, 2025
This news might come as a shock to Rodriguez, who seems confident in his team. At one point this offseason, he even told the press his team's attitude was "as long as they're keeping score, we're going to whoop your ass." But that might not come to fruition for the Mountaineers, as Kelley Ford gives them zero percent chance to win more than seven conference games this upcoming season.
But even beyond that, the Mountaineers are given just a 3% chance to win six conference games, and a 12% chance to win five conference games. The league does seem to be a bit of a toss-up in some regards -- every team (including West Virginia) is given at least a 60% chance of winning three conference games, but not a single team is given more a than 43% chance to win seven. So while WVU aren't likely contenders according to the ratings, many teams have a pretty fair shake at winning the conference.
The Kelley Ford projections have Kansas State projected as the Big 12 Champion in their standings, with Arizona State in second place. HailWV's 2025 Power Rankings have Texas Tech at No. 1 and Arizona State at No. 2, with the Mountaineers checking in at No. 10.