Pitt Redshirt Diaries : Bill Stewart

Coach Stew gets his poll wish. . . sort of

Chuck Finder — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 15:54:00 GMT

Little more than two months later, the voters listened to Bill Stewart.

It was the Nov. 2 afternoon after The Associated Press pollsters restored Stew's West Virginia crew to the rankings, at No. 20, for the first time since a September free-fall from No. 8 with a 1-2 start. Saith the coach then: "I don’t want to hear anything about that. That’s where all our trouble started. That’s the worst thing that can happen to Mountaineer football right now. I’d tell every pollster, 'Wait until Game 12, and then you can rank us.' We were ranked all right – we were rank."

Well, it didn't happen until Game 13, after WVU's Meineke Car Care Bowl defeat of home-state North Carolina, but the voters made the Mountaineers No. 23 in the final AP poll released early this morning.

It marked the Mountaineers' unprecedented fourth consecutive Top-25 finish, after being Nos. 5, 10 and 6 the previous Januarys.

Louisville slugfest

Chuck Finder — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 16:25:00 GMT

An updated version of the artistry previously known as: Two teams that really don't like each other

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- As part of the friendly rivals' fire that resurfaced in pregame warmups and lasted into the aftermath of this 35-21 West Virginia victory Saturday, Mountaineers quarterback Patrick White -- who jawed at, looked back at and taunted (while running down the sidelines for touchdowns) and pancake-blocked most any Cardinals in his proximity -- had some not-so-nice words about one Louisville player in particular.

On a Noel Devine cutback run, White took a moment from his NCAA record-setting rushing day to block 6-foot-3, 285-pound Cardinals defensive tackle Earl Heyman and topple him to the stadium turf. Heyman took umbrage, grabbing White and rolling him over in what became a two-man somersault. They arose to jaw and posture at one another.

Said White afterward: "He tried to break my neck. No need for ignorant, dirty play."

Then White, still miffed that linebacker Preston Smith denied this incident happened in the teams' meeting last November, added this little nugget: "At least I didn't get spit on."

White admitted that after the last of his three touchdown jaunts he began snapping his fingers in the end zone, showing everyone that his 200-yard day was a "walk in the park." As for establishing the new NCAA Division I-A standard for rushing yards in a quarterback career, the senior shrugged and added that the record will mean something to him "maybe one day when I'm old and in my rocking chair with my grandkids." One last White tidbit: He finished with 1,115 career yards rushing/passing plus a 3-1 record vs. Louisville.

More post-game doodads: Coach Bill Stewart: "I was so frustrated at half. Had 215 yards rushing, two blown opportunities [inside the Louisville 11-yard line]. I wanted to cry, I really did. But I can’t do that." . . . Offensive coordinator Jeff Mullen joked of White’s record-breaking, 4-yard run, which was two yards shy of a first down: "That’s the only time he slid all year, the knucklehead." . . . Mullen on West Virginia rushing for a season-high 376 yards against major-college football's heretofore eighth-stingiest rushing defense, all behind an offensive line with Seneca Valley's Don Barclay, in his first start, subbing for Greg Isdaner (head, though he played one series) and Eric Jobe, in his second start, subbing for Mike Dent (neck): "You kidding me? And you replace two all-Big East, All-American candidate guys. We didn't replace a couple of stiffs. That's crazy talk." . . . West Virginia allowed a third-quarter touchdown for only the second time all fall, ending a string of four consecutive games and six of seven without a third- or fourth-quarter score. . . Stewart pooh-poohed the pregame-warmup fracas between the teams, saying his Mountaineers didn't breach protocol by standing on Louisville's midfield Cardinal logo. A few wild punches were thrown, but coaches and game officials separated the two sides.

Scratch Dent?

Chuck Finder — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 01:08:00 GMT

The second-best college football starter from Jeannette High may have taken his last Division I-A snap.

West Virginia starting center Mike Dent on Tuesday night talked of having a doctor later this week re-evaluate the swollen pinched nerve in his neck, the malady that caused numbness down Dent's arms in the Connecticut game Nov. 1 and a few days later effectively removed him from the Mountaineers' lineup, This fifth-year senior since was erased from the two-deep depth chart and replaced in the starting lineup by Eric Jobe, who is practicing with the first team when left guard Greg Isdaner isn't taking a few snaps at center. Dent said he hopes to play Saturday at Louisville and prepares to start when he "goes to practice very day and takes mental reps. Watches film." But it doesn't sound convincing.

Another Mountaineers member said he thought Dent isn't supposed to see a doctor until next week, and Coach Bill Stewart continued to completely bypass the normal injury coachspeak -- aren't we all "day to day" on this planet? -- and again Tuesday labeled Dent's status as "week to week." Only three regular-season games remain for West Virginia: at Louisville, at Pitt the day after Thanksgiving, and South Florida at home on Senior Day Dec. 6.

"He's definitely going to be missed," said Jobe, who started and played the Mountaineers' Nov. 8 overtime loss to Cincinnati.

"You can't replace a Mike Dent," offensive coordinator Jeff Mullen added. "You're talking about a kid who's a probable NFL performer. An all-Big East player."

Dent, whose high-school basketball records were erased by the same Ohio State starting quarterback Terrelle Pryor who earns the most Jeannette collegiate attention, was second-team all-conference last year and a Rimington Trophy watch-list candidate this fall. He started 21 consecutive Mountaineers games until this ailment.

Of defense and outer space

Chuck Finder — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 15:49:00 GMT

The subject of the recently stout West Virginia defense -- with six sophomores and one freshman starting, salute -- will be scrutinized inside the inky pages of the PG in coming days. But, first, we wanted to run past you a couple or three innerestin' digits.

Since the opening five minutes of the Colorado game, when the host Buffaloes stomped up two hasty touchdowns, the Mountaineers' defense has:

* Yielded just five touchdowns in the past 355 minutes of regulation and one overtime (their 59 points in this span equate to roughly 9.8 points per game, which would rank them second only to USC's touchdown-per-lousy-Pac-10-game average).

* Allowed just four touchdowns, along with seven field goals, in opponents' 17 trips inside the Red Zone (that 64 percentage would rank them sixth among all major-college programs, although, as it is, they stand No. 16 overall in the category).

* Prevented the opposition from scoring on 81 percent of its possessions (Alabama and Penn State, by comparison respectively, are only 1 and 2 percent better for the entire season).

If you really dig math, you'll figure that something's gotta give this week against Cincinnati, which scores on average one of every three possessions this fall.

One note about the special teams, particularly the kickoff-coverage unit that ranks 119th and last: Courtney Stuart (knee) will miss three to six weeks, Jim Lewis (foot) another week and Archie Sims (apparent concussion) an indefinite period, Coach Bill Stewart said. Added the coach: "I asked what planet Archie was on in a meeting and he said 'Earth,' but he looked to me like he was on Jupiter."

Oh, and as expected -- he did beat then-No. 24 South Florida last week -- Tony Pike will start at quarterback for Cincinnati.

Healthy for Thursday: Liebig, White and. . . Auburn's coach?

Chuck Finder — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 21:01:00 GMT

The injury update for West Virginia-Auburn at Mountaineer Field Thursday:

* Defensive lineman Pat Liebig is expected to return to play as a backup after missing the past three Mountaineers (4-2) games due to a lingering concussion.

* Mountaineers quarterback Patrick White is ready and "raring to go" against the Tigers (4-3), Coach Bill Stewart said today, after missing one game and one quarter, also because of a concussion.

* And Auburn coach Tommy Tuberville, despite rumors and internet reports, didn't have a stroke.

He said it, not me. (And you thought Stewart and West Virginia were catching flak. . . .)

“Over the last week or so, there obviously have been a lot of things said,” Tuberville began at a news conference this afternoon in Auburn, Ala. “I just want everybody to know things are going good. I did not have a stroke. I’m not tired of coaching. I’m as fired up as ever. I feel as good as I ever have about coaching. I still have that drive; I read that my drive was gone[, too.] No, we did not negotiate a contract last week. That’s a new one that came out. . . . I’ve been here 10 years. I plan on being here 10 more years.

“It’s just amazing the rumors going around when things aren’t going as good as you hope. No matter what happens, you’re going to have years where it doesn’t work out. I’m looking forward to the next five weeks and seeing how we can do. All the detractors from outside that keep throwing stones at us, that’s fine. I appreciate the sympathy cards for all my illnesses and all that. I go to church, and people ask me if I'm all right. I knew right then this thing was getting out of hand. That's why I wanted to make a short statement that I'm going to make it through the week.

"That's a paid policital announcement from Tommy Tuberville."

Oh(ffense), what a difference a WVU year makes

Chuck Finder — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 02:48:00 GMT

This is a subject to be tackled in next week's print editions, after the vaunted -- or is it vaulted? -- West Virginia offense gets its chance at Syracuse's sixth-to-last-ranked defense Saturday at Mountaineer Field. But quarterback Patrick White tonight offered a piece of insight that requires prompt sharing.

"We have to understand every time we touch the ball, it's not going to be a big play or touchdown," White said on the subject of the unit that Coach Bill Stewart has started calling a "ball-control" offense. "Coach [Jeff] Mullen's philosphy is, every down is third-and-four."

Let's pause to allow for proper digestion: They're always shooting for four yards, minimum. Maybe that explains some of the short-yardage sweeps, huh?

Some numbers with which to wash that down: Through five games last season -- with Steve Slaton, Owen Schmitt and Darius Reynaud on hand, of course, but also with White and Noel Devine and the same offensive line as well -- the Mountaineers averaged 40.4 points and 507 yards offensively. Through five games this season, they averaged 23.2 points (nearly half as many) and 357 yards (two-thirds as many). At this point last year, they had 41 offensive plays and 10 touchdowns of 20-plus yards; this fall, they have 14 (one-third as many) and five (half). More astonishingly, at this point last year, they had 20 running plays and seven touchdowns of 20-plus yards; this fall, they have nine (less than half) and one (a margin so wide it blew out my abacus). There were, by this juncture a year ago, a half-dozen plays from scrimmage and three touchdowns longer than any single play these current Mountaineers have produced yet, and their top three are all quarterback rushes.

While receiver Tito Gonzales maintains that Mullen the offensive coordinator is locking away the offense for full unveiling later in the season, it may well set off alarms if the Mountaineers this Saturday cannot shred Syracuse, which ranks 114th (of 119 major-college teams) in yards permitted per game, at 462, and 111th in points permitted per game, at 36.

One final note: White, withheld from contact in practice tonight and perhaps most of the week, didn't look so good to me, though I'm neither a trained medical professional nor someone who slept the night before in a chain hotel. Said he of the lingering "dinging," in Stewart's words, from Rutgers last Saturday: "I’ve never had my bell rung like that, but, playing football, you are going to get hit. I got hit. I feel pretty much normal."

Pretty much.

RU ready for some football?

Chuck Finder — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 16:00:00 GMT

And other Friday football questions involving this Rutgers-West Virginia fray in a curiouser and curiouser Big East:

1. Coach Bill Stewart maintains that he refuses to throw his players under the bus, but would you consider this tossing tailback Noel Devine into the Bonzai Pipeline? "Stay in the wave," he said he counseled Devine, after No. 7 gathered 88 of his game-high 125 yards rushing against Marshall on whoa-Neillie, reverse-field runs. "Ride the wave. [Exhibiting patience is] the biggest thing Steve [Slaton] did here, Quincy [Wilson] did here and Avon [Cobourne] did here, everyone we've had. Patiencew to the hole, speed through the hole. Patience to the hole, speed through the hole. He's given up on the wave. I want to see the wave crest. What do you tell a guy who does one of those Nintendo runs? "OK, good job. But you better watch, you need to ride the crest. . . . We're not riding that crest. We're dnot doing everything we need to be doing right now. We're getting better. We're getting closer. And we're gaining on it. What I'm still trying to tell the coaches, we're going to come to a game [where Nos.] 5 and 7 need help. We've got to be able to become more than one-dimensional -- that's No. 7 -- or more than two-dimensional -- that's No. 7 and No. 5 -- football team."

If nothing else, credit the old-school Stewart for invoking Nintendo instead of, I dunno, Atari.To help out, we've invited Coach Laird Hamilton to provide Devine intervention (see bottom).

2. Could senior stalwart middle linebacker Reed Williams truly consider a red-shirt? He has, under NCAA rules, two more games to play before deciding whether to punt the rest of this season and petition to return for one more because of his aching shoulders from offseason labrum surgery. It was instructive that Tuesday, when reporters asked the normally voluble Williams to stop for player-interview questioning, he rushed off saying he had a class project. Stewart said earlier that Tuesday, in advance of the Rutgers game Saturday at Mountaineer Field: "We're going to watch him and see how he does. Last Saturday he was good, but the guy's hurting. He's his own best doctor. You can take MRIs, you can take X-rays, you can see doctors. But you're your own best doctor. Every guy that's sick [or hurt] here, I tell them, 'I want you to be honest with me, becuse you're the expect on your body.' Then we make a calculated decision"

3. Could Rutgers tailback Kordell Young, earlier this week left for season-ending injured, make a return Saturday at Mountaineer Field? Tom Luicci of The Newark Star-Ledger has the details.

4. Do you see progress in these Mountaineers? Stewart does, though he seems to be admitting they were overrated at No. 8 and unready for what awaited them at the starting gate: "I saw it in Boulder. I knew in Boulder we had a chance to be a good football team. Great football team? No. Eighth in the country? No, never. Not yet. Not yet. . . . Are we back? No. Are we on the way back? Yeah. I don't think we ever lost it, we just weren't real good early. We went to East Carolina and got whacked, got tagged. I think that's all been rectified. Will we get beat again? Could. Hope not. Those two games, at East Carolina and at Boulder. . . , I think made our football team grow. I really do, I believe it. Now did it grow for the better? We'll see. We'll see."

Stew asks so many questions, he oughtta be a reporter.

5. DId you see where one of Mountaineers' fans least favorite sports writers (present company excluded) opined, with a colleague, that West Virginia and Rutgers were among college football's biggest disappointments thus far?

Finally, a Big East thought: Pitt's rousing upset over No. 10 South Florida could, in the short-term, further present a deletirous affect for the conference in the polls and perhaps even early BCS rankings. Without one dominant team, or a couple of sturdy ones, the conference appears to finally become the prophecy of skeptics years ago after the departure of Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College: a mediocre football conglomeration of basketball schools. Watch the polls Sunday afternoon. If undefeated Connecticut falls at North Carolina on Saturday and tumbles from the rankings along with USF, it's quite possible that no Big East school will appear in the Top 15, Top 20. . . perhaps even the entire Top 25, though that's doubtful. See, with Louisville on the borderline and UConn still not considered among the big boys, the league needed either West Virginia or Rutgers, or both, to remain strong alongside either USF or Pitt, or both.

He was Marshall

Chuck Finder — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 19:18:00 GMT

West Virginia coach Bill Stewart, who coached at the Mountain State's other Division I-A program way back when Jimmy Carter was in office in 1980, steadfastly refused to hear any such talk. Earlier this week, when the notion was raised about assistant head coach/safeties coach Steve Dunlap offering some insider-trading insight on the Marshall where he worked as defensive coordinator last season, Stewart immediately tossed it aside. Won't happen.

But offensive coordinator Jeff Mullen was willing to listen.

"It's like if we were playing Wake Forest," he teased of his former employer, "I'd throw 'em all under the bus."

Seriously, he said he planned to pick Dunlap's brain about personnel, but there is no great information to be gleaned about systems or signals because the Thundering Herd has two new coordinators. Mullen even downplayed that type of scouting report, too: "Once the ball is kicked and the first punch is thrown, none of it matters. I mean, you've got to perform."

About this governor-mandated series: Truth be told, Rich Rodriguez wasn't crazy about it. He felt the game did little to enhance the Mountaineers' strength of schedule and program overall -- if they played poorly or, as on Dec. 1, went full-monty rotten, it would only hurt them come the polls and bowls. But Stewart the successor embraces this baby as if it were a long, lost relation. Said Stew: "I can't imagine growing up in this great Mountain State and not having any kind of interest in this game. It's great for college football. Should be very, very emotional. I can't wait to whip 'em. I can't wait to punch them right in the nose. That's the way it is in a family."

Now, a celluloid moment in honor of Marshall gameday:

Return of the B-word at WVU

Dan Gigler — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 21:27:00 GMT

It's baaaaaack: the term buyout.

Just when West Virginia administrators, donors and fans thought it was safe to jump back into contract waters, up rises that frightening fin again. Let alone the fact that the university, the fan base, the state was pulled into national attention -- talk about deep, murky waters -- by the WVU Board of Governors v. Rodriguez case, but when school officials seemingly were making an effort to get out of the business of Termination Clauses or Liquidated Damages, out comes the news about powerful people being angry that such language was inserted late into Bill Stewart's new deal.

And here's that deal.

Update: If you were wondering about how some of the Mountaineers players were responding to fans' unrest and attitude toward the somewhat embattled coach. . .

Safety Quinton Andrews: "I feel pressure to win. . . . There is always going to be pressure, and me being the person that I am, I want to do my best so Coach Stew can look really good, because I know he's trying his best. The whole team feels the same thing, and we want to keep him as our coach."

Cornerback Ellis Lankster: "We just ignore [the pressure], but at the same time we are going to respond to it to get our fans back and make them happy."

Williams, Wes Lyons and widdle Devine to see first/more Mountaineer time

Chuck Finder — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 22:10:00 GMT

Colorado should expect to see Thursday in its own Folsom Field: middle linebacker Reed Williams and receiver Wes Lyons of Woodland Hills High for the first times this season, and more of tailback Noel Devine.

Hey, Coach Bill Stewart claims he tells his Mountaineers nothing but the truth, so help him, so why would he deceive the stinking media?

Stewart today, approaching his first game as the official, signed, sealed and contract-delivered head coach of West Virginia, pronounced a few new wrinkles for the Buffaloes:

* "Reed Williams will play," Stewart said of the 2007 team-leading tackler and Fiesta Bowl defensive MVP, who had offseason surgery on both shoulders. "We had a talk yesterday, Reed, myself and the medical people. Reed Williams is going to let it go. We couldn't block him [Sunday in practice]. And I was, like, 'Wow.' He's ready to go. Brings another level of excitement to our team. Moxie, swagger. . . what's a good buzzword? He brings a presence to us.

"He's just one guy, but he's one special guy. I left it up to him. I left it up to our medical people. He felt like he should go. Be good to have old Reed out there." Williams' return also means Gateway's Mortty Ivy can return to strong-side linebacker from the middle.

* "We'll play Wes Lyons more at receiver 'cause he's earned it," Stewart continued of the junior receiver slow to recover from August arthroscopic knee surgery. "I told him that when you show me you could go two hard weeks, then we'll get you in there and we'll play you. Wes Lyons will get in there this week. He'll help us."

* The diminutive dynamo Dynamo (with Jock Sanders what Stewart calls his Mighty Mites), after 15 touches in each of the opening two games, will get the ball a lot more often somehow, someway, the coach added. (You think the Buffs read these enemy-territory blogs/sites or listen to those internet-archived news conferences? Nahhhh.) "Dagnabit," said Stewart, who last week vowed more belly-option runs. "I wish you hadn't brought that up. He needs to get the ball more. You can't just have 54 plays a game, that's first and foremost. If he can tough it 18 to 22 times out of the backfield, five to seven times on screens and that. . . . We've got to get him in the rhythm, get him in the flow. We will really try to get the ball in the little guys' hands more, yes we will."

Stewart also said that he expected to play one or more backup offensive lineman -- most likely Seneca Valley's Don Barclay, moved from left tackle and currently listed as right tackle Selvish Capers' backup. Another depth-chart change was the switch of Pat Liebig to starting defensive end, ahead of Weirton's Zac Cooper and Larry Ford, with end Julian Miller moving to backup nose tackle -- Liebig's previous spot -- behind Chris Neild.

Speaking of Stewart's new contract, announced late last week in the wake of that East Carolina loss, it should be noted that the man without an agent needed roughly eight months and nine days to formally complete the deal -- a scant 10 days shorter than the purported Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight, Rich Rodriguez's team. And the new guy didn't even have one of those wieldy buyout clauses, making him the second of the past three newly signed Mountaineers coaches to go without one. Women's basketball coach Mike Carey was the other, last February, just days after lawyers representing the university filed the lawsuit against Rodriguez over that doodad.