It was another nasty blowout loss for the West Virginia Mountaineers on Saturday, and it seemed like almost nothing was going in favor of WVU football. However, two areas of WVU’s game were more bleak than other areas.
WVU’s rush defense and pass rush were nowhere to be found in the blowout 45-13 loss to UCF on Saturday. Later on, we will break down both how the pass rush and the rush defense looked, but as the 45-13 score would predict, WVU did not look good in any area, offensively or defensively. One could argue that WVU did not look even average in any area on Saturday.
Pass Rush Nonexistent
WVU failed to record a single sack against the Golden Knights of UCF. After Saturday’s loss, WVU now ranks 11th out of 14 teams in the Big 12 in sacks as a defensive unit. To add insult to injury, WVU could not even manage a quarterback hit on Saturday. UCF quarterbacks were almost untouchable against the WVU defense. In what was supposed to be a moderately improved unit with the addition of defensive coordinator Zac Alley, it has yet to pan out that way for WVU.
The only time that WVU was able to get pressure on any of the three UCF quarterbacks was when Alley called a blitz to send more guys at the quarterback than UCF had in protection. Even with the blitzes that were dialed up, no one was able to get home and take the quarterback down in the backfield. When WVU only had a four-man blitz, UCF quarterbacks had all the time in the world to sit back and go through their progressions and make the right read.
Rush Defense Gets Gashed
This was one of the worst rush defense efforts since Oklahoma State’s Ollie Gordon II ran all over WVU’s defense in 2023. Gordon II finished with 283 rushing yards and four rushing touchdowns in a 48-34 win over the Mountaineers on October 21, 2023. Thankfully, the performance against UCF was not as bad as that performance, but it was one of the worst rush defenses since that game.
As a team, UCF recorded 35 carries, gained 255 rushing yards, and reached the endzone three times on the ground on Saturday. Averaging 7.3 yards per carry, UCF could not be stopped on the ground in its blowout win against WVU. After Saturday, WVU is sixth-worst in the Big 12 for rushing yards per attempt on defense, giving up 4.2 yards per carry, and fifth-worst at rushing yards per game as a defense, giving up 169.3 rushing yards per game.
With games against Texas Tech, Houston, and Arizona State left on the schedule – all of whom are in the top eight of the Big 12 in rushing yards per game – WVU’s rush defense needs to figure it out, and they need to do it soon.