College Football Playoff: Which Top 25 teams are contenders, pretenders?
After losing their first game of the season to rivals the Virginia Tech Hokies, the West Virginia Mountaineers have been on an absolute tear in 2017.
The team’s offense, led by junior transfer quarterback Will Grier, has put up an astonishing 195 points in only four games, and are currently ranked second in the nation in total offense with 2,422 yards from scrimmage and 26 touchdowns on only 321 offensive plays, a big improvement from last season’s 17th ranked offense.
Simply put, the Mountaineer’s offense is absolutely loaded with talent and has seven different offensive players who have recorded at-least 100 yards of offense and can boast nine different players who have scored a touchdown for the Mountaineers in 2017.
However, West Virginia’s defense in a completely different story. After ranking an incredibly pedestrian 74th in the nation in total defense last season, the team has regressed considerably to the 106th ranked defense in 2017, averaging an abysmal 431 yards per game to opposing offenses while also giving up 12 touchdowns in only four games.
Even with a top-tier offense, it will be incredibly hard for the Mountaineers to overcome their atrocious defense, especially with games against high-powered Big 12 offenses like TCU, Texas Tech, Oklahoma State and Oklahoma looming on the horizon.
While it’s incredibly unlikely that West Virginia will match their 10-3 record from 2016 in 2017, they will at least be able to compete in every game they play moving forward.