West Virginia wide receiver Cam Vaughn (4) fights to make the catch defended by BYU cornerback Evan Johnson (0) during the second half of an NCAA college football game, Friday, Oct. 3, 2025, in Provo, Utah. (AP Photo/Tyler Tate)

West Virginia coaches and players have a lot to do during the week. They have to correct the past and then quickly prepare for the future. There are only a couple of days to do so. This is similar for journalists. Sunday and Monday are for looking at what happened in the past, and then you quickly have to move on to the game ahead.

You can look at stats, box scores and watch some highlights, but you don’t get the nitty-gritty details that a full-time beat writer would.

So, we reached out to the TCU football beat writer for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram to get the finer details on the Horned Frogs before their matchup with WVU. Here is what beat reporter and AP voter Steven Johnson had to say about TCU:

Strengths

When TCU is at its best, it has one of the best receiving cores in the Big 12, maybe even in the country. Eric McAlister, at one time, he was top 10 in receiving yards. TCU had three different receivers who had over 100 yards in a game this season.

Josh Hoover, when he’s playing at his best, is one of the better quarterbacks in the country.

Defensively, the Horned Frogs are doing a really good job of forcing turnovers. TCU is one of the elite defenses in the country at forcing takeaways against Power Four competition.

Obviously, the defense has some playmakers with Jamel Johnson, Bud Clark, and Kaleb Elarms-Orr. In general, the Horned Frogs’ four-man pass rush isn’t great, but they do a great job of dialing up pressure and getting creative with their blitzes.

The three strengths for TCU are its receivers and passing game with Josh Hoover, its ability to force turnovers, and its creative blitzes to pressure.

Weaknesses

When Josh Hoover plays in Fort Worth, he’s one of the best quarterbacks in the country. But when he’s on the road, he’s been average. He’s thrown 20 touchdowns on the road and has had 14 picks, and that doesn’t include multiple fumbles. The biggest thing, if West Virginia wants to win the game on Saturday, it needs Josh to kind of have one of those multi-turnover games, like he had at Kansas State, where Kansas State had a pick-6, and Josh through a pass behind the line of scrimmage that turned into a scoop and score.

TCU’s third-down defense, with the exception of against Baylor, has been a weakness. Some advanced numbers pretty much show that on first and second down, TCU has had a top 50 or top 40 defense in terms of how successful it’s been of holding opponents to second-and-8, and third-and-7, but when it gets to third down, TCU does have one of the worst third-down defenses in the Big 12. Teams have been able to convert third and loads of them.

The Horned Frogs have kind of struggled a little bit with defensive pass interference. It would not be a surprise if they led the country in DPIs.

The run game is a question mark. There have been some games where TCU runs it really well. There are other games, like Arizona State, where the Horned Frogs only had 10 yards rushing with the running back. It really depends on what version of Josh you get. On the road, TCU’s run game has been hit or miss.

TCU’s starting kicker is also out. The Horned Frogs might have to be inside the 10-yard line to attempt a kick.

Takeaways from Baylor win

TCU was kind of dominating, and then it got closer in those final three minutes. TCU went up 42-21, and Baylor just kind of pulled off this almost epic comeback at the end of the game.

It wasn’t as close as the final scoreboard looks. TCU dominated that game for 57 minutes, and then Baylor went on one of those runs you see in college football to make it close.

TCU really needed that win. The program really needed that because the fanbase got anxious after the Kansas State loss. For whatever reason, TCU just can’t win in Manhattan, or it really struggles in Manhattan. Most of the media thought TCU would lose to Baylor.

TCU controlled it wire to wire. It was an impressive bounce back. It showed the ceiling of TCU.