Defense is key for WVU against Cincinnati

By Bob Hertzel

MORGANTOWN — When West Virginia buses — yes, buses — to Cincinnati on Thursday, they will bring with them the one thing that gives them a chance to beat the No. 5-ranked, undefeated Bearcats in Friday night’s nationally televised game.

That one thing is this unconventional 3-3-5 odd stack defense they use.

Rest assured, if they are to win the game, they will do it on defense.

Now it’s true that the Bearcats have been something of an offensive juggernaut, that being the word WVU coach Bill Stewart used to describe them. They scored 70 points against Southeast Missouri State this year, scored 40 or more in three other games and never scored fewer than 28.

Nationally they rank sixth in passing offense, third in total offense and fifth in scoring offense at 40 points a game.

Now you may ask why one would suspect WVU’s defense, which had been rather ordinary until holding Louisville without a touchdown last week, should hold the key to victory for the 7-2 Mountaineers?

The answer is history.

Brian Kelly’s offense has been truly that juggernaut, except against the Mountaineers.

Last year, while Cincinnati did win, it did so in overtime, scoring only 26 points and one of the touchdowns was a 100-yard return of the opening kickoff by Mardy Gilyard. But offensively, quarterback Tony Pike had a tough go of it, completing just 16 of 30 passes for 178 yards. The Bearcats managed only 178 rushing yards and just 12 first downs.

And the last time in Cincinnati, WVU won the game with its defense, scoring a 28-23 victory, holding the Bearcats’ running game to just 84 yards. While Cincinnati did pass for 323 yards in that game, the Bearcats possessed the football only 22 minutes and 59 seconds, the WVU defense twice recovering fumbles and getting them off the field.

Looking at that, as good as Kelly has been in creating an uptempo, spread offense that wrecks havoc on defenses, WVU has been solid in its approach.

Why?

“Without giving away our secrets, I think when you play a 3-3 stack, you may give away a little bit of a pass rush, but we know that,” said Stewart. “What it does is always gives you an extra guy, always. I remember a couple of years ago we had a young quarterback confused, because there was always an extra guy in the hole, so to speak.”

That young quarterback played for Oklahoma. His name was Sam Bradford and he won a Heisman Trophy the next year.

The idea is that you never know where that extra man is, and so you may be running a pattern across the middle and there he is or it may be in the flat or coming on a blitz.

“It has confused a lot of quarterbacks in the Big East, very good quarterbacks,” Stewart said.

The defense, of course, isn’t perfect for everything.

“No matter what the defense, you are going to give up some things, but the 3-3-stack stops the run,” Stewart said. “We think we match up with them pretty good.”

Interestingly, Brian Kelly has decided to go with his hot hand at quarterback in Friday night’s game, Zach Collaros from Steubenville, rather than to play Pike, who is coming back from an injury and has missed the last three games.

Kelly had indicated on Monday that if Pike was healthy, he would start. Pike broke his non-throwing arm last year and had a plate put into it. Four games ago he was hit and the plate slipped, leading to surgery to put it back in place.

“If Tony is fully healthy, he’s our starter,” Kelly said Monday. “The issue is if this becomes day-to-day. There’s so much out of my hands relative to the risk factor. If that’s not an issue and you take Tony Pike’s body of work, Tony Pike is the starter. There’s no question about that.”

Pike’s familiarity with the WVU defense, too, figured to be a factor but Pike either isn’t fully healed or Collaros’ performance in his three victories has been so overwhelming that Kelly doesn’t want to take away from the momentum, even though this will be Collaros’ first look at a 3-3-5 stack.

NOTES: It appears that the only WVU player in danger of missing the Cincinnati game is defensive tackle Josh Taylor. Stewart said on Tuesday that both quarterback Jarrett Brown and running back Noel Devine were running around at practice ... “Jarrett Brown is moving around well and looks to me like he has his feet back under him,” Stewart said. “His foot was sprained, but I told him that I wanted him to be alive in the pocket and have fun. I want him to play like it is sandlot football. He needs to pick it up and he knows it. We all need to pick it up.”

E-mail Bob Hertzel at bhertzel@hotmail.com.

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