“Good evening, folks, and welcome to Mountaineer Field! I’m Tony Caridi. Tonight, beneath an April sky filled with more stars than Leonardo DiCaprio’s Oscar’s afterparty, it’s the annual Gold-Blue game. Twenty four days and 14 workouts ago West Virginia University began its third spring practice under Coach Bill Stewart and tonight is the payoff as together the Mountaineers not only conclude the spring segment of their season, but break from tradition and play the intrasquad scrimmage for the first time under the Friday night lights at Mylan Puskar Stadium to benefit the WVU Children’s Hospital. Kickoff is just a few minutes away and it’s John DePasquale versus Coley White on the Mountaineer Sports Network…”

Dream scene? Not exactly.

Quite quietly the WVU coaches revealed yesterday Eu Smith’s left foot will almost certainly prevent him from doing anything significant in spring practice. Injured in a conditioning workout late in January, the initial timetable for his return after surgery was six weeks.

That doesn’t seem so accurate now and, as Jeff Mullen pointed out, the feet and the rotator cuffs are the things a quarterback doesn’t want to go bad. Foot injuries can linger — this is the second time Smith’s broken a bone in his left foot — and the Mountaineers are prepared to practice without Smith doing much apart from skeleton drills.

“It’s a big, big deal and it certainly affects how we call plays in the spring, it certainly affects the drills we run and it certainly affects Geno Smith in the long run in terms of his ability to grow and mature,” Mullen said.

This is where things get interesting. The quarterback competition is, in essence, Coley White vs. Coley White. However, Coley White was supposed to experiment with slot receiver in the spring because WVU felt that good about not only Smith, but incoming freshmen Barry Brunetti and Jeremy Johnson.

Some things have obviously changed, except for Mullen’s high hopes for the freshmen. Right now, he said they are “by default” in the top three. He has their names on the depth chart in his office.

“Really our top three quarterbacks – and I don’t mean anything negative toward Coley – but realistically, our top three quarterbacks or our top two quarterbacks or at least our top one are not going to participate in spring practice,” Mullen said.

– Also, some clarity on the Logan Heastie matter. He’s in no legal, school or football trouble, but just hasn’t been around lately. After a so-so workout last month, Heastie left the Puskar Center and never returned. Couple that with a rough report card last semester and he’s hit the brakes. He’s spoken with Chris Beatty and Lonnie Galloway and the two coaches and Stewart have spoken with his parents, but Heastie and Stewart have not talked to one another.

Stewart classified it as “him related,” meaning Heastie is at a point right now where his experience at WVU hasn’t meshed with his expectations. He’s simply trying to figure out if he wants to continue playing football and if it’ll be at WVU, at this level or somewhere else.

Stewart was clear and emphatic when explaining Heastie had done nothing wrong and the issues were reconcilable. Heastie is welcome back any time, including for spring practice.

“That’s if he wants to,” Stewart said. “I’m not giving up on him. I’m not going to yell at him, I’m not going to be hostile toward him, I’m not going to challenge him.”