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No. 12 WVU Expecting Crazy Atmosphere at Tech

Defense to receive stiff test against Red Raiders

MORGANTOWN — If there is any member of the No. 12 West Virginia University football team that can attest to the raucous atmosphere the unbeaten Mountaineers will face when they run out onto the field at Jones AT&T Stadium, it is WVU head coach Dana Holgorsen.

“I’ve been there a few times,” Holgorsen said. “And, we have several players who have played in that atmosphere, so they know what to expect.

“It’s good to be me having him (redshirt senior quarterback Will Grier). We’re going to keep training the rest of them, too. No matter who it is, you have to function at a high level. He’s doing a good job right now. And we’re well aware of what their environment is. I’ve seen it up close and personal for a long, long time. We’ll be ready to go.”

Holgorsen, who took over the Mountaineers prior to the start of the 2011 campaign, was the inside receivers’ coach in Lubbock from 2000-2004, and then took over as the offensive coordinator of the Red Raiders from 2005-2007.

It’s that kind of raucous atmosphere that has Holgorsen and his assistants, especially on offense, concerned over the Mountaineers’ lack of ball security at times.

“We have to clean that up — by no means am I saying turnovers are OK. I’m not saying that,” Holgorsen said. “But those turnovers (against K-State) did not hurt us in that game. There’s no difference in driving 50 yards and throwing an interception on the 5 or having a 70-yard punt that lands on the 5. I’d rather move the ball and do it that way than three-and-out and punt it down there.

“And a fourth-down stop is no different than a turnover. It’s a turnover on downs. They don’t chart it that way, but it’s a turnover on downs. So, Kansas State’s turnover in the second quarter was way more detrimental to them than any of our turnovers were that were actual turnovers. We chart it a little bit differently, but if we’re reckless with the ball, which that was a freshman mistake from Leddie (Brown), which he’ll learn from it, and then Will, the only critical thing I have of him are those two decisions he made that happened to be interceptions.

“We have to clean that up because those things can hurt us moving forward, especially if it happens at different parts of the field. That’s been addressed, and we’ll try to get better at it.”

And, TTU’s defense has done a good job through it’s first four games of taking the ball away from its opposition — having picked off four passes and recovered a trio of fumbles.

“That’s a big emphasis, especially this week,” offensive coordinator Jake Spavital explained. “Coming off our past performance of having four turnovers, that was the message to the team Sunday night.

“When you get further into conference play and you get into tighter games, those turnovers are going to be very important to our success, not just as an offense but as a win-loss record as well. It’s an emphasis where we’re going to add extra ball security periods this week and just make sure we’re covering all the bases, because this is a team that takes a lot of pride in the extracurricular in terms of stripping the ball out. We just have to be on point with that. We have to take care of the football.”

More importantly, today’s outcome could be affected more by WVU’s defense and its ability to record negative plays — especially on first down.

“We’ll be simple game plan-wise,” defensive coordinator Tony Gibson explained. “We won’t have a lot of calls. That’s been our recipe for the last four years with this team. It’s so we can get lined up quick. The one thing that helps us is that we’re not a field and a boundary defense. That’s the one advantage we have is that we play against tempo teams. Then, also, we get to go against our offense every day and during camp. We don’t do a lot of formation stuff, but we can go really fast as well.”

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