Welcome to the Friday Feedback, which has its eyes on a prize this weekend. Your over/under for total points Sunday is 55. I find that interesting. In the previous coach’s three seasons, the final scores against Marshall were 27-3, 24-7 and 24-21. With The Product? Try 42-10 and 48-23. Certainly Dana Holgorsen is going to move the needle, but to what extreme?

Consider this: In his first game at Houston in 2008 and his first game at Oklahoma State, Holgorsen’s offenses averaged 60 points, to say nothing of plenty of yards and a slew of superlatives for players, teams and first games. So you can believe WVU will score some points Sunday. Holgorsen has proved that through the years.

“The advantage in that style of play was the players had so many reps prior to the first game that they felt like they’d been in the system a year or two already,” said Oklahoma State Coach Mike Gundy, who hired Holgorsen from the Cougars to invigorate his offense.

From the beginning, when he was introduced in December as the offensive coordinator, Holgorsen surprised audiences with how simple he made his offense sound. The installation, he said, would take three days. Subsequent days would be spent revisiting the lessons from those first three and refining what was learned.

The playbook was thin and contained a small number of plays. He and his coaches would add almost nothing during the season and instead take the things they felt comfortable with and practiced most during game week.

That was the background for all of the time spent preparing for the first game. The players were prepared and Holgorsen feels the same now.

“I think our guys understand what to do,” he said. “We should know what to do, which means we’ll play fast. If you accomplish that, you should be moving forward.”

The Mountaineers are just half of the equation, though. Marshall’s offense is going to offer some unknowns and surprises and that will test and bend a defense that will be susceptible to those unknowns and surprises. There are new starters and new players on defense and you can’t ask them, or expect them, to be perfect from the outset. So the Thundering Herd will score, too.

Can they hold hands and get past 55? Or does Vegas know something we don’t know?

Onto the Feedback. As always, comments appear as posted. In other words, don’t bare too much.

(P.S. I changed the Twitter avatar for the weekend. I’ll try to make the avatar appropriate for every game. Quick question: If you’re familiar with “icing,” can people “Mike” other people? Or did CSC cover that in the alcohol management training?)

Gordo said:

Can someone explain to me why Shawne Alston is not even being mentioned in the running backs competition among tailbacks or fullbacks?

I can now: He had an injury we never knew about and it kept him out of practice for three weeks. Prior to that revelation, I remember Holgorsen saying highly complimentary things and vowing to find ways to use the big back in the running game. I could have sworn he was even mentioned in that group of seven.

JL said:

Go back and read that Colorado game story Casazza linked and see if it doesn’t set your blood to boil all over again

Well, if you must, here it is. I know it got one guy’s blood boiling — and that was the beginning of our end — but that’s not my point here. That was Stewart’s third game and, I think quite clearly, he had a hard time at the end of the game. The clock moves fast when the game gets late and the first time you’re in it, you’re really in it. It happens to lots of people. Could happen to Holgorsen. Remember, in Rodriguez’s first game, he won the toss and chose to kick, meaning he had to kick to start the first and second half. In that case, you’re supposed to defer your decision to the second half. The opponent obviously chooses to receive because when the second half starts you’d choose to receive. Keep an eye on things like that Sunday, and early in the season: End of the half/game situations, use of timeouts, challenges, new rules, so on and so forth.

Jeff in Akron said:

Kirk “Herbie” Herbstreit picked USF to win the Big East and picked BJ Daniels as the best QB in the conference. I guess that explains why Herbie no longer has an AP vote for the top-25.

I honestly wonder if he’ll play the whole season. Sounds like they’re high on Bob Eveld.

pushthebutton said:

Instead of this video we should play a clip of Oliver Luck saying things like, “I didn’t feel like we had the chance to compete for a national championship,” and, “at the end of the day, results matter.”

Autotune, of course.

Simple Jack said:

Here’s hoping that means Dana cares about a style point.

Tried to figure this out this week and as best as I can tell, he wants to be prolific, but doesn’t want to project that. I’d say it’s more important to the fans that he be exciting than it is to him, but it does matter to him.

Dr. Love said:

Have you heard that John Flowers has signed to play professional basketball in Japan?

Indeed, he’s bound for the Saitama Broncos. Good for John. Seems like I saw him in Hibachi every time I went there, which isn’t often.

ccteam said:

Oliver Luck has clearly said 9-3 is not good enough to keep your job more than 4 seasons. Trouble this year is I think 9-3 or 8-4 is a very likely outcome. New head coach, inexperience at running back and linebacker, an offensive line that is yet to prove itself, a questionable kicking game, depth problems across the board all conspire against the 11-1 or 10-2 that many are predicting. Not that it couldn’t happen, but everything would have to go right for it to happen. Will the masses be satisfied with another 9-3? Will Ollie?

It’s tricky to judge seasons this way. Remember, Luck canned Stewart when he was 5-3 and because the product wasn’t particularly compelling. A bunch of things come into play: Who do you beat, who do you lose to, are you exciting, are fans invested, so on and so forth. If he’s 9-3 and wins the Big East — or 8-4 and wins the Big East — and they average 38 points per game, that’s still a god season, right? Really, what’s different between that and one of those 10-win seasons? I get the point, I just don’t think Luck is demanding 10 wins a season or else.

Bill said:

Also, any update on that new walk on QB from Ky?

He’ll dress and travel, according to Jake Spavital, but neither Paul Burchett nor Ian Loy take any snaps during game week. It’s an 80-20 split between Eu and Millard. For what it’s worth, [eople tell me Smith was ridiculous in practice this week, bouncing around and feeling very good about himself.

WVUinDC said:

Watching Cato’s highlight reel seems to show that he is most comfortable throwing deep routes. Most of his reel shows him through go-routes, posts, and corner routes. Not really so much underneath stuff. Don’t get me wrong, there are some clips of him throwing shorter outs and hooks but mostly a fairly accurate deep ball. should be interesting.

My biggest wonder, will Doc shake Coach Wooderson’s hand after the game.

Heard some of that this week, but mostly WVU doesn’t know much about the kid. And apparently WVU hasn’t seen anything of Travon Van, the running back from California via a New England prep school. As for the handshake, I believe these two gentlemen actually get along.

JC said:

No CBS games?

Possibly later, but looking at the schedule and the days of the week, I wouldn’t count on it.

overtheSEC said:

9 PM starts = me screaming at Cincinnati at 9:25 PM, continuing to foul even though they’re down by 13 with 1:45 to go, all while watching the score of our game in the upper corner, then cursing an ESPN producer as they go to a courtside interview with Buzz Williams to have to listen to his gravelly voice tell us about his team’s hustle

I’ll be screaming, too. Different reasons, same frustration, though. Always fun to watch a 40-minute game for two hours and the run from press row to an interview room and then back to press row to type 800 words in six minutes.

Wvmaniac said:

Mike, give me two reasons why I should and two reasons why I should not be concerned about Sunday’s game?

Worry: Weather, special teams. Don’t worry: History of Dana’s first game, Marshall’s experience at skill positions.

Drew said:

What is the over/under on how many Red Bulls DH consumes on Sunday?

I’ve heard he can drink 10 on a hot day. I’ll put it at 8.5.

overtheSEC said:

My dad, a WVU alum, occasionally calls MU, “Marshall-by-the-drink University.” I thought his reasoning was always anecdotal and hadn’t really heard it too many other places so chalked it up to tall talk. But in some downtime today, finally found confirmation in—of all appropriate places—a Daily Mail article from earlier this year

Legislators eventually struck a deal to give Marshall its university status.
West Virginia was a dry state at the time, but some lawmakers wanted to legalize selling liquor by the drink.
“That came up at the same time … the Marshall University bill was up,” Gould said.
Northern lawmakers who supported loosening the state’s liquor laws compromised with southern lawmakers seeking university status for Marshall. One group got a new university. The others got the OK to put an alcohol referendum before voters, Gould said.

Please join me in calling that school down south, “Marshall by-the-drink University”

If it’s in the newspaper …

rekterx said:

I love the idea and I hope that it does turn into a significant pregame tradition.

But I think the topic of the day, after assimilating the new entrance video, is this breaking story: Depth Chart Wars!
http://www.wvillustrated.com/wvufootball/story/id/1320

Curious story, indeed. I hate to keep going back to it, but do you read that story any differently when you see “behind the scenes” and “While taping the Dana Holgorsen Show last week …” and you remember these are the people who have paid for that access?

glibglub said:

I like the idea, but …

They need an actual mantrip to provide some much needed context for the uninitiated, i.e. the vast majority of fans ingorant of coal mining. I was checking out some WVU message boards and was fairly alarmed at the lack of knowledge as to what a mantrip is, and based on that dearth of knowledge, the mistaken assumptions of what the Mountaineer Mantrip was intended to represent. If you just say mantrip, and don’t have an actual mantrip in the picture … well, it sounds too much like manscaping or man purse or man cave, etc.

Love the idea. Someone should be pushing a mantrip in the procession. Rig it with all terrain wheels if you need to. You’re right — a lot of people don’t know what it is. I think the most common misconception was that this was some sort of a trip men make from the hospital to the locker room. Not so. Show the people why.

SD Smith said:

Agree with Mike, just trying things like this means a lot.

But isn’t it a bit sexist? I mean, women trip all the time.

See?!?!

The 25314 said:

Wal-Mart is the number one employer in the state now, I think we should have the Mountineer Greeting. Coaches and players can pass out stickers as they walk to the stadium.

Oh! And they can check your bags when you go inside. They’ll help find smugglers trying to undermine beer sales.

Simple Jack said:
The name is cheesy and touching a lump of coal is even cheesier. I guess walking in is ok. If you HAVE to give it a name and you HAVE to touch a lucky charm, why not make it relate to the university instead of an industry.

I’m with you, but I think it’s hard to separate the school and the industry in this state. Remember, we’re watching the Friends of Coal Bowl Sunday. Not saying it’s right. Just saying that’s what it is.

philip said:

keep it simple. guy in the lead carries a lunch bucket and a pickaxe. make it a team honor.

There’s potential here — for good and for bad.

NotSoFastMyFriend said:

Upon first hearing of this Mantrip I thought it was a WVU football fantasy camp.

Much like the name “Friend of Coal Bowl”, I find the name uninspiring. The idea? Not bad. My only humble suggestion would be for a night game to have a single player lead the team down the path with only one headlamp going with it being dark all around. That may look pretty cool.

Oh and remember not to throw “stuff” on gameday.

I think that would qualify as “good,” but I wouldn’t push the envelope much more than that.

Patchy said:

It’s derivative, contrived and focus-grouped. It’s the opposite of spontaneity and/or tradition and therefore not a good thing.

What’s next? A section called the Grove?

I hope not, in that I hope this “new tradition” doesn’t branch off into other similarly themed “new traditions” in the stadium. For this to catch on, it has to remain unique.

lowercase jeff said:

patchy – interesting. i keep hearing it referred to as our “new tradition”. new tradition? having a new tradition is like giving birth to a teenager. it may be a teenager one day, but it aint a teenager yet.

but, once you accept the fact that this is clearly not a tradition, the standards are reduced. not in a qualitative manner, but in terms of how defensive you are of the status it is trying to attain.

the mantrip is not a tradition, is not even on the ballot to be so, and cannot be judged like it is.

what it is, is something we’re trying to do this season to see if it has a real impact on the general feel of the program. if it has a negative impact, it’ll go away. if it has a positive impact, it’ll stay. it’ll be fun. we’ll do it next year and it will be neat.

but then, five years and 10 weeks from today, the undefeated mountaineers led by ford childress will play host to 8-2 pittsburgh. it will be -22 degrees and the prior day will have seen 14 inches of snow. game on. all day there will be whispers that the mountaineers will cancel the mantrip and there will discussions
as to the wisdom of such a move. finally, around 4 oclock tony will announce on live air that the West Virginia Mountaineer Mantrip is on, and that he’ll see us all on nehlen at 530. the team will walk the mantrip amid fluries as the frosty breath of one hundred mountaineers fills the air. far from alone thanks to the 70,000 west by god virginians, the mountaineers finish the mantrip, and hang half a hundred on the f***ing piece of s**t pittsburgh panthers that ripped our heart out nine years prior.

we go on to defeat florida 41-24 in the national championship game.

the next year, 100,000 west by god virginians line the streets as the defending national champions take part in one of the country’s great traditions, The West Virginia Mountaineer Mantrip, on their way to the season opener.

Enjoy the weekend!