West Virginia's first fall scrimmage was "productive" with room for improvement

Dominion Post

4 days ago

MORGANTOWN — West Virginia capped off its first full week of practice with an intersquad scrimmage on Saturday inside Milan Puskar Stadium.
It'd been 126 days since WVU's last scrimmage, the Gold and Blue Spring Showcase, and Saturday's scrimmage was similar. Rich Rodriguez said he ran around 100 to 110 plays during the scrimmage, going over multiple different situations. Everyone was live during the scrimmage, meaning everyone could be hit, even the quarterbacks.
It was a closed practice to the media, and the only spectators in the stands were coaches' families or other WVU personnel. There was a public address announcer to give it more of a game feel, and Rodriguez tried to gamify it by handing out points for successful plays.
Rodriguez's biggest problem was the penalties. WVU had a Big 12 officiating crew there, and they called a couple of procedure penalties, some holding calls, which Rodriguez compared to turnovers, and one unsportsmanlike conduct penalty after a touchdown.
Rodriguez was especially unhappy with his player about the unsportsmanlike call.
'I told him next time, just keep running into the locker room,' Rodriguez said. 'They'll learn. They'll all learn from it. They're pretty conscientious.'
Overall, Rodriguez seemed content with the first scrimmage. He'll do more reflecting after watching the film.
'I thought it was a productive day from a head coach standpoint,' Rodriguez said. 'You see the defense won some, the offense won some. That's probably a pretty good thing.'
This was the first time the quarterbacks went live, so when they took off for a run, there could be consequences.
Rodriguez didn't talk too much about how the quarterbacks did passing the ball, or if any quarterback made any leap above the competition in the position battle, but he was pleased with how the quarterbacks ran, going live for the first time.
'I thought the quarterbacks ran competitively today, which was the first time they were really live, live in this situation,' Rodriguez said. 'Sometimes they ran a little sideways, which we're fixing, but I thought they were pretty competitive running today.'
One of the worries for Rodriguez heading into this scrimmage was how many plays he could run because he didn't have a lot of depth at running back. Thursday, Rodriguez said WVU was down to just two backs, Jahiem White and Diore Hubbard. Friday, Cyncir Bowers was back at practice. Saturday, WVU's running back room was back at four, with Kannon Katzer practicing again.
Rodriguez said Hubbard, White and Bowers showed flashes during the scrimmage, but still had things to learn.
'There were a couple times, though, in short yardage, where we got to stick our foot in the ground and get the one yard, two yards, and press the line of scrimmage,' Rodriguez said. 'We're still learning that.'
Rodriguez said tight ends had a 'pretty good' day blocking, and the slot receivers had some 'big' catches during the scrimmage, too. He didn't think there were any big plays out on the perimeter, but he'll have to rewatch the film to be sure.
Defensive coordinator Zac Alley thought the defense's performance was a tale of two halves, or in this case, a tale of the beginning and the end of the scrimmage.
Alley said the defense started really fast and executed, forcing the offense to punt. However, towards the end of practice, Alley said the defense 'fell off.'
'I challenged the guys afterward to maintain the first play, the first quarter, and the last play, the fourth quarter, the same,' Alley said. 'They're both as important, and you never know which one wins the game. Just maintain the energy, the execution, the effort, with technique throughout the entirety of a game, a scrimmage, whatever that is, we've got to be better at that.'
The fall off wasn't because the team wasn't conditioning. It was more a lack of anticipation. The defense wasn't anticipating what would happen on a third-and-long on the 50-yard line compared to a third-and-short on the 2-yard line.
'We got to do a better job of understanding the situations,' Alley said.
During the scrimmage, Alley and Rodriguez tried to make it as game-situational as possible. Alley gave a couple of his mike linebackers helmet communication, so he could simulate what it's going to be like during the game. He doesn't use it to call plays because that's done on the sideline with signals, but he does use it for relaying what he sees and what to look out for.
'Just so they get used to hearing me in their head,' Alley said. 'If they have to go in the game and do it, it's not the first time they've heard me yelling at them before the snap.'
Rodriguez said the defense tackled 'OK', and Alley said the defense did 'pretty well' Saturday.
'It was one of the better first scrimmages I've had for sure,' Alley said.
WVU didn't do any live special-teams plays during the scrimmage, but Rodriguez had the punters and kickers kick and punt a couple of times.
During the upcoming week, WVU will have a day where the special teams go live to do some evaluation.