The Sock 'Em, Bust 'Em Board Because that's our custom

In which Dana Holgorsen channels his Emeril Lagasse

April 14, 2011 by Mike Casazza

WVU’s offensive coordinator and eventual head coach just grabbed a healthy pinch of spice and threw it into the rivalry with Pitt. BAM!

When asked recently if he was worried that opponents would try to steal his signs, Holgorsen casually referenced new Pitt coach Todd Graham.

“Ask him,” he said. “He’s obsessed with it.”

When asked about Holgorsen’s assertion the following day, Graham seemed surprised. He declined to comment, before adding that all teams look for whatever edges they can find.

Another coach who can recruit a wide variety of players

by Mike Casazza

That could very well be Bill Bedenbaugh, who was in Texas and the Southwest, Arizona and the Pacific Coast and now West Virginia and the Snow-shoveling.

Trust me, there’s a point.

Might he be able to recruit from all three constituencies to get his ideal line? Maybe, but that’s never his plan. He recruits to the blueprint and, if need be, shops around for the right materials.

“You recruit to a system,” he said.

“Look at the offensive line at Arizona. They were 6-foot-7 tackles, 6-foot-4, 6-foot-5 guards, 320, 330 pounds. The center can be a smaller guy – 6-2, 290, 300 pounds. I just think you recruit to the system. I don’t think the guys out there had a different body type. They had a different personality.

“They grow up on the beach surfing and all that stuff. These guys are like me. They grew up shoveling snow. That creates a toughness, a hardness to you. At least that’s what I’m hoping, that we can find guys like that.”

Quite the kerfuffle at practice today

April 13, 2011 by Mike Casazza

Coley White caught a pass and then caught a bodyslam from linebacker Donovan Miles, who finished off a prolonged gang tackle of Mr. White.

That prompted a robust rebuttal from Tyler Urban and then simultaneous field-storming by the offense and defense, which was punctuated by diminutive Daquan Hargrett running at and toppling much larger Tyler Anderson.

And we got to see it!

“I said, ‘If you guys want to fight some period, let me know and I’ll put in instead of break we’ll just call it fight period and you can go out there and box,’” Head Coach Bill Stewart said. “We’ll put boxing gloves on and full pads and they can just have fun.”

I’m always amazed and impressed how players and coaches maintain and restore order in these fiascos, but it never fails. This one was tidied up in a hurry and practice concluded a few minutes later with a gentlemanly handshake line. Spring football!

P.S. Brad Starks was, by Stewart’s estimation, “a little dinged” late in practice.

The BoG wants your comment

by Mike Casazza

Quite a few people and People have emailed, texted or told me they’ve been informed and entertained the past few days by the discourse here about the proposed beer sales. Pretty proud of that and of you. Again.

Not only is that give and take the reason we’re here, but it’s also that which the BoG is interested in observing on its own right now.

The official policy and revision is available now and the BoG is sincerely serious about fielding and evaluating the feedback. If you want in, give it a read and email comments to  Valerie.Lopez@mail.wvu.edu by May 13, 2011.

The importance of being earnest

by Mike Casazza

Josh Francis is the latest junior college All-American to detour to West Virginia’s defense and — stop me if you’ve heard this — looks like the kind of guy who is going to matter immediately. Francis is a linebacker who looks like a linebacker and moves like a skill position player. More often than not, that combination finds him with his facemask near the football.

Almost all of the focus through six spring practices has been on offense, but Francis is the guy who has opened eyes on defense and forced peers to say things like this:

“Josh has great athleticism, head to toe, and he’s so fast. The guy’s a flying bullet,” said WVU strongside starter Najae Goode, the experienced veteran (13 career starts) among a young Mountaineer unit. “This defense is a little different to learn, but the stuff we build on every day, he’s already a lot better.

“The big thing is that Josh’s 50 percent is 100 percent for everybody else, kind of like that.”

Why, imagine if Francis finds a way to give it 110 percent on 100 percent of his snaps! Many did and Francis, originally from Maryland’s Damascus High, had to decide in the end if WVU was a better fit than North Carolina and Arkansas (he also had looks from, among others, Oregon and USC). The Mountaineers prevailed and can thank a divine intervention.

“Coach Casteel, he actually coached my pastor, Clark Baisden (of Difference Makers Church, a Wesleyan congregation) when he was in college back at Shepherd,” Francis said. “That was a big upside for me.”

Baisden, who also is an assistant football coach at Damascus High, played in the secondary for Shepherd in the late ’80s, when Casteel was an assistant there. Baisden is a Buckhannon native, Casteel said.

A call to legs at WVU

April 12, 2011 by Mike Casazza

Interesting thing about WVU’s football roster: No fullbacks.

Everyone is a running back and neither Dana Holgorsen nor Robert Gillespie will discriminate between the bigger backs or the smaller backs.

WVU has 10 running backs on the roster and no longer makes the distinction between running backs and fullbacks like Clarke, Matt Lindamood and Ricky Kovatch. There’s been little difference on the field, either, as everyone runs and catches the ball and blocks to get better at the all-important pass protection in Dana Holgorsen’s pass offense.

Gillespie has offered no other option early in spring practice.

“I’m fine putting Ryan Clarke back there to carry the ball and block and I’m fine putting Trey Johnson out there to run out the backside and go cut the defensive end as much as I am Lindamood – but Trey Johnson better get his little (posterior) back there and cut that end if he wants to play football and carry the ball,” Gillespie said. “That’s the way we’re teaching them right now.”

Gillespie, as you can probably tell, has a way with words that seems to inspire something in his pupils. The mere message that everyone is everything and all will be treated and evaluated evenly is music to all ears in the backfield.

And in particular, the players who were in the background last season but have an opportunity to start anew in 2011.

“Bringing in the new (offensive) coaches is one of my favorite things,” Hargrett said. “I would have loved to show the other coaches that I could do it, but bringing in new coaches, everyone starts from scratch.

“It’s like coming in here from high school, just proving myself, as if they recruited me, and I just go out and play where I think I should have been, the way I played in high school.”

Why Oliver Luck thinks beer sales will work and why I agree

by Mike Casazza

Think fast! Name the school that had the riot in the stands last season. The one where the media, with near unanimous conviction, blamed alcohol sales within the stadium for stoking the tension among the fans.

No such school exists. Never happened.

People are really worried about WVU selling beer at football games now and preparing for the worst, but there’s nothing out there to suggest the Mountaineers have created a monster. In fact, they’re pretty much falling in line with a lot of other schools. Not sure how that’s a bad thing these days.

Change always seems controversial around WVU and what the university, Oliver Luck and the Board of Governors proposed Friday fell right in line with that. They’re going to sell beer! No more pass-outs! No more smoking in the concourse! And with that, the propositions were, by many, chained together and dropped into the ocean of awful ideas. Never mind the public comment period the BoG created for its education and the public’s benefit.  

Many others gave it thought and consideration and made peace with the propositions and the consequences, whether they liked them or not.

Fact is, it’s 2011 now and the smoking battle is losing one. For years people have complained about the smell and the litter in those concourse areas behind the seats and the plexiglass barriers where smoking was allowed. Smokers crowded close to the barrier to see the game and get their fix. The fans who are sitting in their seats in the rows right in front of that concourse and have had to deal with the smokers behind them must now be relieved.

Additionally, no one in the Big East and no one in most professional leagues allows fans to leave the stadium and return. A lot of high schools prohibit that. I’m frankly surprised it took WVU this long to adandon that practice, which was the biggest cause of the biggest gripe about the stadium crowds — if you let people out, many of them are not coming back.  

And this is what caught Luck’s attention last year.

“I’ve been around a lot of stadiums and a lot of different crowds – college, professional, different sports – and the one thing that surprised me was the number of people who left at halftime,” Luck said. “It was shocking. In some cases, there were tens of thousands of people leaving at halftime and a lot of those folks were not coming back.”

Now, this is where things get weird. To maintain an audience, yet encourage reasonably rowdy behavior, WVU proposes selling beer. Right away you can see how that keeps people in their seats, especially if they’re no longer permitted to leave the stadium and return.

But how does that address fan behavior?

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Holgorsen explains ‘diamond’ formation in less than 7 hours

April 11, 2011 by Mike Casazza

One of treats Dana Holgorsen is going to spring upon the masses in just a few weeks for the spring game, and later, in just a few months, for the season, is his three-back set.

Oh, three-back sets are nothing new. Anyone who’s seen a wishbone or triple option or Maryland I or even Bruce Carey team play has seen three backs on the field at once. Why, WVU even did it on occasion last year in short-yardage and goal line sets.

Ah, but Holgorsen does it from the shotgun and, of course, with great success. Born out of  “sheer boredom” in his offseason at Oklahoma State, the “diamond” formation, as it came to be known, became that Cowboy’s best friend. (Sorry.)

Oddly enough — and isn’t this how things often work in football and in ingenuity? — the success came with a twist. Oklahoma State was to return to Holgorsen nice running backs and a very capable offensive line. The three-back set ended up doing just fine with the run, but Holgorsen actually predicted it would free up the passing game.

“We came up with the three-back system to isolate the outside guys,” Holgorsen said. “It’s easier for the quarterback to see if it’s man, one-on-one coverage when they’re all packed in as opposed to being spread out and those guys being able to disguise a bunch of stuff.”

Those guys would be the defenders and the diamond forced the defenses to play a little more transparent. By concentrating its personnel in the middle of the field and posing the possibility it can pass or run, the offense encourages the defense to make a decision.

“When you’ve got three backs in the backfield and the two wideouts go out, you’ve got to go out and cover the wideouts and take your chances stopping the three backs, or you have to drop a safety in and go one-on-one with your corners,” said WVU’s defensive coordinator, Jeff Casteel.

Not to say I’m too busy …

by Mike Casazza

… but I’ve got a lot on my plate. This Villanova thing is unfolding — and seems to be unraveling — rapidly and other things are afoot. Let’s not neglect the news of the weekend, though.

Ford Childress apparently gave up his dream of running wild in the Sprint Cup Series to play college football. He’s picked West Virginia and before he hits the summer camp tour in Texas. I know, I know. We always proceed with caution and I’d have to think that’s especially true with a kid from Texas who hasn’t had Mack Brown or Texas A&M or anybody else in his living room to talk about the future.

Yet as told to West Virginia Illustrated, Childress is stuck on WVU.

Hill says he has been fielding calls from other schools the past two days and has told them each that Childress is no longer available. Childress and his family are people of their word and would not go back on a commitment, says Hill.

“He told Coach Holgorsen, I believe, he said that we’re giving you a commitment and for us, that’s as good as gold,” says Hill. “They want to play for Coach Holgorsen. Oklahoma State had called me yesterday morning and I told them that he was up at West Virginia and was going to commit and they were upset and they asked me how solid was it, I said, ‘It’s firm.’ He wants to be a Mountaineer.”

This is exciting. Supposing  Childress puts pen to paper and signs in February to play for WVU, he has to be one of the school’s top five best-named quarterbacks, right? And shouldn’t Peter Secret and Gory Hogg be worried? We need a list, everyone. And I’m certain Josh24601 has a head start on all of you on this.

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Remember this date

April 8, 2011 by Mike Casazza

Big and bold initiative by the BoG:

Revised Policy Request
Board Chair Carolyn Long announced a request from the Department of Intercollegiate Athletics to amend BOG Policy 18 (Section 4.1) to permit controlled beer sales at certain athletic events. Details of the proposed policy will be available on the Board’s web site (bog.wvu.edu) sometime next week for a 30-day comment period.

The proposal is one of several changes the athletic department is considering for game day operations centered around improving security, fan behavior and public safety at Milan Puskar Stadium this fall. These include revisions to practices around exiting and re-entering the stadium and moving smoking areas outside the concourse, athletic officials say.

A little more after the jump.

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