I’m off to Lawrence, Kan., today, where two years ago I saw one of the strangest things ever. WVU lost to Kansas, which had lost 27-straight Big 12 games, and then the fans rushed the field. It’s still hard to believe, but that was the deepest part of the lowest time of Dana Holgorsen’s five seasons with the Mountaineers. Bad!

The Jayhawks are very different, except for the few players who remain and the fact they’re still  paying Charlie Weis, and WVU is trying hard not to focus too much on that season’s game. Linking Saturday to Nov. 16, 2013, links this team to that team and this team believes it’s come a long, long way since then. Kansas really has not with but one Big 12 win since then.

So the Mountaineers are taking the high road, one would think, out of respect for their own gains as well as for the opponent that’s young and trying hard and nothing at all like the one that won two years ago. But the high road is also a place where WVU feels like it belongs, if only because it believes its in a better place then the Jayhawks.

But don’t believe the Mountaineers are totally over that loss and that memory and they’re immune to channeling experiences for motivation. Because they are not.

“It was terrible,” senior cornerback Terrell Chestnut said. “That’s what it was. Terrible. The whole thing. Everything was terrible. Anytime an opposing team storms the field against you, it’s never a good feeling. It humbled us.”

That feeling is more familiar than the Mountaineers would like. A season ago, the Mountaineers lost to TCU on a field goal as time expired and then played uninspired a week later in a loss to Texas.

“That’s the game that really derailed our season,” Chestnut said. “We were sure they wanted to come in and do the same thing to us.”

So the motivated Mountaineers and their healthy memories beat the Longhorns last week, and Chestnut said it was his idea to pick up Holgorsen and crowd-surf him around the locker room — because that’s what happened to Texas coach Charlie Strong the year before.

“No disrespect to him, but I got tired of seeing Charlie Strong get crowd-surfed by his team in the locker room after playing us,” Chestnut said. “I think it was only fitting we did that when we beat them.”

I’ll leave you with today’s road game challenge: Final score and critical statistic, in honor of Kansas grad and noted sabermetrician Bill James.