MORGANTOWN — West Virginia came into camp with a lot of questions about the offensive line and now, as camp winds down, there may be more questions than ever as the Mountaineers have shaken up the line.
Eric Jobe came into camp as the starting center but recently was moved to right guard while Joey Madsen moves in at center. Jeff Braun, who had been the right guard, now is the swing man between both positions.
But nothing is settled.
“We’re evaluating things every scrimmage. It’s not a permanent thing,” said Dave Johnson, the Mountaineer offensive line coach.
Madsen is a redshirt freshman and admits he has some nervousness.
“There’s going to be some anxiety, especially against our defense. They come at you from everywhere,” Johnson said. “But every day he’s getting better and learning more.”
When asked how Madsen had done in a scrimmage on Wednesday, Johnson answered:
“He’s still at center.”
Next scrimmage, however, Braun will get a look at center.
Decisions probably won’t be made until the week before the Sept. 5 opener against Liberty.
o o o o o o
West Virginia’s Da’Sean Butler and Devin Ebanks are among the 50 preseason candidates for the 2009-10 John R. Wooden All-American team and Player of the Year award.
The award, which is college basketball’s equivalent of the Heisman Trophy, and the All-American team are named for former UCLA Coach John Wooden.
Notre Dame’s Luke Harangody is the only returning Wooden All-American and has a chance to become a three-time Wooden All-American. He has averaged better than 20 points and 10 rebounds in each of the past two seasons, last year averaging 25.2 points and 12.8 rebounds.
Also back on the preseason list from last year are Sherron Collins of Kansas, Duke’s Kyle Singler and Kalin Lucas of Michigan State.
West Virginia, with Butler and Ebanks, was one of two schools with two candidates, joining Kansas (Collins, Cole Aldrich), Michigan State (Lucas, Raymar Morgan), Duke (Singler, Jon Scheyer, Michigan (DeShawn Sims, Manny Harris), North Carolina (Ed Davis, Deon Thompson), Purdue (Robbie Hummel, E’Twaun Moore), Connecticut (Kemba Walker, Jerome Dyson) and Villanova (Scottie Reynolds, Corey Fisher).
Butler led WVU in scoring as a junior with 17.1 points a game while setting a WVU record for most points scored in a game at the Coliseum with 43 against Villanova.
Ebanks, a tall, lean freshman last year, came on strong in the second half of the season and averaged 10.5 points a game while leading the team in rebounding with 7.8 a game.
o o o o o o
The West Virginia women’s soccer team was given a preseason No. 16 ranking by Soccer America. A week earlier the National Soccer Coaches Association of America ranked Coach Nikki Izzo-Brown’s team No. 14 in the nation.
The Mountaineers are favored to win their division in the Big East this season.
E-mail Bob Hertzel at bhertzel@hotmail.com.
Bob Herzel
Mountaineers shake up O-line
- Bob Herzel
-
-
HERTZEL COLUMN: Patrone finally gets his due
Lee Patrone says he remembers it vividly, even though more than 50 years have passed, and while it was the greatest accomplishment in his life it has nothing to do with the West Virginia University basketball career that has lifted him into the Class of 2012 that will be inducted into the Mountaineer Sports Hall of Fame in September.
-
HERTZEL COLUMN: No doubt WVU made out well
There was a cold, ill wind blowing in from the north on Friday.
It was the kind of wind that blows whenever a Pitt man opens his mouth, as the Pittsburgh athletic director Steve Pederson did. -
Tears and memories: VIDEO
It was mid-Thursday afternoon at the Morgantown Event Center and the crowd stood mostly silently in line that wound out of the Events Hall and into the hallway toward the staircase.
A young lady was there holding a singular golden rose
“I wish,” Rebecca Durst said, “it could be gold and blue.” -
HERTZEL COLUMN: Stew fondly remembered by players
The tributes have poured in all week for Bill Stewart, the former West Virginia University football coach whose sudden and unexpected death from a heart attack at age 59 on Monday stunned the state, but it wasn’t the administrators or executives or politicians who really knew him.
-
HERTZEL COLUMN: White right there with Hall of Famers
Back on New Year’s Eve, 2008, shortly after West Virginia University had edged North Carolina, 31-30, to win the Meineke Car Care Bowl, an attempt was made to put Mountaineer quarterback Patrick White into his proper historical perspective.
-
HERTZEL COLUMN: Pat Beilein follows in father’s path
In a day filled with the sorrow of former West Virginia University football coach Bill Stewart’s sudden and unexpected death, there was a ray of sunshine that managed to slip through, a happening that shows us all that even in death there is life and as one son grieves, as does Stewart’s son, Blaine, somewhere else a father basks in pride over his son.
-
HERTZEL COLUMN - Stewart’s gift was giving
It was the kind of cosmic happening that defies description. We all come across them from time to time, leaving us in a state of disbelief.
-
HERTZEL COLUMN: This ‘Maniac’ makes music with Kilicli
Mike Martin wasn’t long removed from his New York roots, a somewhat rare import in these parts compared to the migration of New Jerseyites who matriculate at West Virginia University.
-
Van Zant fired as WVU baseball coach
West Virginia athletic director Oliver Luck believes with a new coach and a new stadium the Mountaineers can compete with the likes of Texas and Oklahoma for the Big 12 baseball championship but understands it will not come easily or quickly.
-
SEC, Big 12 team up for bowl
Even before the full impact of West Virginia University’s 2014 season-opening meeting with Alabama in Atlanta has been grasped, the opportunity presented itself for the two to meet again later in that season or future ones in a bowl agreement between the Big 12 and SEC that is much like the Rose Bowl agreement between the Big Ten and the Pac-12.
- More Bob Herzel Headlines
-
HERTZEL COLUMN: Patrone finally gets his due
