MORGANTOWN, WV- There were a lot of firsts in the West Virginia Mountaineers win over Texas Tech on Saturday, Sept. 23.
First, oddly enough, it was redshirt freshman quarterback Nicco Marchiol’s first career start. It was also the first win over the Red Raiders for coach Neal Brown since he has been in Morgantown and WVU now possesses their first 3-game winning streak under the fifth-year head coach.
More importantly than those secondary records, the Mountaineers now sit at 3-1, (1-0 big 12) and have given their fans at least a little bit of hope for 2023 after a 20-13 victory on a rainy afternoon.
It may not have been pretty, but at this point and especially the way things have gone under Brown, a win is a win and that is all that matters.
“They (TTU) were kind of the darling pick of the Big 12 early in the year,” Brown said after the game.
“Some had them no. 2 or 3 in a lot of these polls in the preseason, so this was a really good win,” Brown stated.
Marchiol, playing for the injured Garrett Greene, threw for just 78 yards and a touchdown to Kole Taylor (3 rec. 39 yds) and ran for 72 more en route to just 256 yards for WVU.
However, Marchiol has greater expectations for himself than what he showed.
“Obviously, not a good quarterback performance on my end. It could have been much better. But what matters is those critical moments that we practiced. Those big fourth downs, those big-time catches,” he said.
The Mountaineer defense was big-time and was the story on this night. They held Texas Tech to 321 yards and their quarterbacks combined to go just 15-for-43 (starter Tyler Shough was injured early). The defense consistently bailed out the offense and got big plays from Lee Kpogba (7 tackles), Tray Lathan (8 tackles), Beanie Bishop (5 tackles, 3 PBUs), Aubrey Burks (7 tackles, TFL, 2 PBUs) Edward Vesterinen (7 tackles, TFL), Anthony Wilson (7 tackles), and Marcis Floyd (3 tackles, TFL, sack, 3 PBUs)
“We did whatever we had to do to get the job done,” Burks said.
“Obviously it wasn’t the prettiest win. We left some plays out there that we gotta fix,” Burks added.
The defense set the tone after Marchiol was intercepted on WVU’s second possession just five minutes into the game. Texas Tech started the series at the WVU 35-yard line but did nothing with it and settled for a field goal with 8:40 left in the first quarter as the Red Raiders took a 3-0 lead.
They did not score another point until the fourth quarter when Jerand Bradley caught a 6-yard TD pass from Behren Morton that made the score 13-10, West Virginia. But the Mountaineers went down the field on the subsequent drive and covered 79 yards on just seven plays. It was capped with Taylor’s 9-yard touchdown catch that put them ahead 20-10.
Defense played great, they picked us up,” Taylor said.
Obviously, a win is a win and it’s big to get the ball rolling in Big 12 play,” Taylor said.
Texas Tech got a field goal a couple possessions later and the Mountaineer defense forced four consecutive incompletions with TTU at their 11-yard line, and WVU survived another close one.
The Mountaineers hit the road next Saturday night, Sept. 29 at TCU looking for their fourth straight win. The game will kick off at 8:00 EST on ESPN 2.
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