Like always in Morgantown, expect an OU-WVU shootout
West Virginia football has played a huge role in Brent Venables’ coaching career. And no, it has nothing to do with a certain Fiesta Bowl 15 years ago, when the Mountaineers ran roughshod over the Sooners 48-28.
On January 4, 2012, West Virginia routed Clemson 70-33 in the Orange Bowl. The game was not as close as the score indicated.
The Geno Smith-led Mountaineers totaled 589 yards. They led 49-20 at halftime and took a 63-20 lead less than six minutes into the third quarter. WVU coach Dana Holgorsen, not always a man of mercy, took his foot off the pedal, else the Mountaineers might have scored 100 points.
Clemson coach Dabo Swinney responded accordingly. He fired defensive coordinator Kevin Steele, then and now a long-time respected football man.
You know the rest. Swinney lured Venables from OU to replace Steele, Venables built a defensive monster that helped win two national championships and now Venables is trying to replicate the Clemson success as the Sooner head coach.
And Saturday, Venables’ maiden OU team plays hard by the Monongahela River, where the Mountaineers for a decade have tried to duplicate that rousing Orange Bowl success.
OU’s defense over the years in Morgantown has been very much like Clemson’s futility of a decade ago. Except the Sooner offense could always keep up.
Since WVU joined the Big 12 a few months after Venables left for Clemson, the Sooners have played in Milan-Puskar Stadium four times and all four times came away victorious but out of breath – 50-49 in 2012, 45-33 in 2014, 56-28 in 2016 and 59-56 in 2018.
Only the pandemic has stuffed the offensive explosions in the Morgantown version of this series. The 2020 game was canceled.
But if OU-WVU on Saturday is a highscoring, wild affair, it won’t be because of some new Geno Smith or Baker Mayfield. It will be because of the kind of defense that got Kevin Steele fired from Clemson a decade ago.
The Mountaineers and Sooners rank 7-8 in Big 12 offensive efficiency this season; where have you gone Tavon Austin and Kyler Murray? But in Big 12 defensive efficiency, the Mountaineers are dead last by a wide margin, and OU can take little solace, since the Sooners are ninth in the 10-team league.
OU offensive coordinator Jeff Lebby can sell his troops on the Mountaineers’ competitiveness in Milan Puskar Stadium. WVU is 3-6 overall, but at home, the Mountaineers beat Baylor, lost in overtime to Kansas and played Texas Christian to the wire.
“They’re a group who’s played a lot better at home,” Lebby said. “They’ve played tough at home. Very aware of how tough it is to go to Morgantown to go up there and win.”
The Mountaineers historically are better at home, but nothing out of the ordinary. In Big 12 play over the years, WVU is 25-22 in Morgantown and 18-30 on the road. That’s about average for a middling program.
West Virginia was counting on Georgia transfer J.T. Daniels to transform the Mountaineer offense, and he’s been a solid quarterback. Nothing special, but OK, with 61.3 percent completions, 13 touchdowns and eight interceptions.
“He throws a great deep ball,” OU defensive coordinator Ted Roof said. “He doesn’t panic in the pocket, and he’s done a good job of throwing under duress. He hangs in there, trusts his protection and gets rid of the ball.
“Regardless of the situation, pressure or no pressure, he’s a tough, gutsy competitor.”
Daniels is capable of turning this game into a shootout. Then again, it’s always a shootout in Morgantown when the Sooners visit.
Venables’ only interaction with the Mountaineers was that Fiesta Bowl 15 years ago. But West Virginia has been good for his career. Beating the Mountaineers straight up, shootout or not, would be beneficial, too.
Berry Tramel: Berry can be reached at 405-760-8080 or at btramel@oklahoman.com. He can be heard Monday through Friday from 4:40-5:20 p.m. on The Sports Animal radio network, including FM-98.1. Support his work and that of other Oklahoman journalists by purchasing a digital subscription today.