No. 19 WVU rallies, rips Norfolk State 55-12

No. 19 West Virginia scored touchdowns on the first five drives of the second half Saturday and the defense kept a second straight opponent from scoring an offensive touchdown as the Mountaineers erased a halftime deficit and beat Norfolk State, 55-12.

"We're a young football team and we're inexperienced and I don't know if we're trying too hard, but we didn't look very good in the first half," Coach Dana Holgorsen said. "I don't know if that's a coaching error as far as not having them prepared or what the excuse is, but I'm proud of the way we came out in the second half and responded to what we said at halftime."

A crowd of 51,911 saw the Football Championship Subdivision opponent set three Mountaineer Field record for penalties and contribute to two others. NSU was flagged 19 times for 177 yards and gave the WVU offense eight first downs by penalty. The two teams also combined for nine first downs by penalties and 262 penalty yards, 10 more than what WVU and Miami combined for in 1994. The Hurricanes committed 17 penalties in that game. The Mountaineers had 158 yards in penalties against Temple in 1983. A team gave its opponent five first downs by penalty six times in field history, most recently by WVU against USF in 2008, but the Spartans beat that by three. That alone matched the combined record totals of WVU and Louisville in 2007 and WVU and Cincinnati in 1980, the first game at the stadium.

The Spartans (1-1) entered 0-3 all-time against Football Bowl Subdivision opponents and had been outscored 128-3, but had leads of 3-0, 6-0 and then 12-10 at halftime against the Mountaineers. WVU answered authoritatively with 28 points on 18 plays in the third quarter. Vernard Roberts and Dustin Garrison had short touchdown runs and Geno Smith threw easy touchdown passes to Tavon Austin and Tyler Urban. The Mountaineers encountered just one third down in the quarter and converted.

Smith extended the touchdown streak on the second play of the final quarter with a 39-yard pass to Ivan McCartney. The sixth drive ended with a 21-yard field goal by Tyler Bitancurt.

"We ran the same plays in the second half we did in the first half," Holgorsen said. "It's all about effort and playing with some tempo. We were dragging. I don't have an answer for it other than we probably just didn't respect the opponent."

Smith completed 20 of 34 passes for career-high 376 yards and four touchdowns. Receiver Devon Brown, a transfer from Wake Forest, had a career-high 108 yards receiving and a touchdown. Austin added 82 yards receiving and McCartney 79.

The offense finished with 533 yards of offense with 390 coming after halftime.

WVU's defense allowed 242 yards in the first half, but just 43 after halftime. NSU was 0-for-9 on third down in the second half.

"Too many yards in the first half, but a lot of that was the offense putting them on the field too much," Holgorsen said. "They were much better in the second half. We're more comfortable with our defensive scheme than we are with out offensive scheme because they have a little more experience."

No. 19 West Virginia scored touchdowns on the first five drives of the second half Saturday and the defense kept a second straight opponent from scoring an offensive touchdown as the Mountaineers erased a halftime deficit and beat Norfolk State, 55-12.

"We're a young football team and we're inexperienced and I don't know if we're trying too hard, but we didn't look very good in the first half," Coach Dana Holgorsen said. "I don't know if that's a coaching error as far as not having them prepared or what the excuse is, but I'm proud of the way we came out in the second half and responded to what we said at halftime."

A crowd of 51,911 saw the Football Championship Subdivision opponent set three Mountaineer Field record for penalties and contribute to two others. NSU was flagged 19 times for 177 yards and gave the WVU offense eight first downs by penalty. The two teams also combined for nine first downs by penalties and 262 penalty yards, 10 more than what WVU and Miami combined for in 1994. The Hurricanes committed 17 penalties in that game. The Mountaineers had 158 yards in penalties against Temple in 1983. A team gave its opponent five first downs by penalty six times in field history, most recently by WVU against USF in 2008, but the Spartans beat that by three. That alone matched the combined record totals of WVU and Louisville in 2007 and WVU and Cincinnati in 1980, the first game at the stadium.

The Spartans (1-1) entered 0-3 all-time against Football Bowl Subdivision opponents and had been outscored 128-3, but had leads of 3-0, 6-0 and then 12-10 at halftime against the Mountaineers. WVU answered authoritatively with 28 points on 18 plays in the third quarter. Vernard Roberts and Dustin Garrison had short touchdown runs and Geno Smith threw easy touchdown passes to Tavon Austin and Tyler Urban. The Mountaineers encountered just one third down in the quarter and converted.

Smith extended the touchdown streak on the second play of the final quarter with a 39-yard pass to Ivan McCartney. The sixth drive ended with a 21-yard field goal by Tyler Bitancurt.

"We ran the same plays in the second half we did in the first half," Holgorsen said. "It's all about effort and playing with some tempo. We were dragging. I don't have an answer for it other than we probably just didn't respect the opponent."

Smith completed 20 of 34 passes for career-high 376 yards and four touchdowns. Receiver Devon Brown, a transfer from Wake Forest, had a career-high 108 yards receiving and a touchdown. Austin added 82 yards receiving and McCartney 79.

The offense finished with 533 yards of offense with 390 coming after halftime.

WVU's defense allowed 242 yards in the first half, but just 43 after halftime. NSU was 0-for-9 on third down in the second half.

"Too many yards in the first half, but a lot of that was the offense putting them on the field too much," Holgorsen said. "They were much better in the second half. We're more comfortable with our defensive scheme than we are with out offensive scheme because they have a little more experience."

Smith was 12-for-16 272 yards and three touchdowns after halftime. He gave way to freshman Paul Millard with 7:31 left in the game. Millard was 5-for-6 for 54 yards and threw a 30-yard touchdown pass to Brad Starks. That gave WVU its final score and its first 50-point game since the 66-21 victory against Connecticut Nov. 24, 2007.

That was of little consolation to Holgorsen.

"We're going to keep them accountable for what they do and keep them accountable for what the team does," Holgorsen said. "There's not a whole lot of satisfaction right now. We've got a long way to go."

The Mountaineers (2-0) play at Maryland (1-0) at noon Saturday at Byrd Stadium. The game will be televised by ESPN. NSU started fast with a 56-yard pass on the second play of scrimmage from UCF transfer Nico Flores to Virginia Tech transfer Xavier Boyce. It was first-and-goal at the 8-yard line, but that was the start of the penalties. The Spartans ended up kicking a 50-yard field goal with Everett Goldberg after Ryan Estep's 40-yard field goal was waved off by a holding penalty.

Goldberg then messed up an onside kick and gave WVU the ball at the 26, but the Spartans defense held and WVU's Tyler Bitancurt missed a 35-yard field goal. Estep gave NSU a 6-0 lead early in the second quarter, but WVU needed four plays to get to the goal line. The offense couldn't score in six snaps -- the drive was extended by a pass interference call -- and settled for a 17-yard field goal by Bitancurt.

"Flat-out embarrassing," Holgorsen said. " Embarrassing. I don't have an answer for you. If you want to say scheme, it's scheme, but we run the same stuff all the time."

The Mountaineers started their fifth drive with 79 yards of offense and were facing a third-and-10, only to be bailed out when a NSU defender was flagged for a helmet-to-helmet hit covering an incomplete pass on second down. Smith moved the offense 81 yards in the next nine plays to take a 10-6 lead with a touchdown pass to Brown. The Spartans got a third field goal and then Holgorsen presided over an unusual sequence that set up another Estep field goal. The Spartans had no timeouts and WVU was looking at third-and-11 at its 22-yard line, but Holgorsen called a timeout to find a play and Smith threw an incomplete pass toward Brown on a short route.

Corey Smith shanked his punt and NSU took over at the WVU 37. Bruce Irvin was called for roughing the passer when quarterback Chris Walley was trying to get rid of the ball and Estep made a 40-yard kick to end the half with the lead.

"It probably had a little more to do with what we were doing than what they were doing," Holgorsen said.

Contact sportswriter Mike Casazza at mi...@dailymail.com^[1] or 304-319-1142. His blog is at blogs.dailymail.com/wvu.

References

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