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The West Virginia Mountaineers will leave West Texas with their unblemished record intact after soundly defeating the Texas Tech Red Raiders, 48-17.
The Mountaineers couldn’t have asked for a better first half, other than having some of those questionable non-calls go the other way, but we’ll chalk that up to “lol Big 12 refs”. West Virginia racked up 392 yards of offense in the first half alone, held the nation’s no. 2 scoring offense to seven points in the first half and kept the Red Raiders to their first scoreless quarter of the season. Mountaineer linebacker Sean Walters came away with a insane interception in the second quarter that changed the course of the game for both teams.
West Virginia didn’t let up in the second half, putting their foot to the Red Raiders’ throat and making a statement on a national stage.
Things started to get a chippy midway through the fourth quarter, with a Texas Tech player and West Virginia cornerback Maurice Fleming both getting ejected for targeting calls on back-to-back plays. The Mountaineers will be without Fleming for the first half of the TCU game next Saturday.
Skyler Howard finished the 21-of-31 passing for 318 yards and 1 touchdown, but it was the Mountaineer ground game that flourished against the Red Raiders. Howard rushed 12 times for 89 yards and two touchdowns, Rushel Shell led the team with 104 yards and two touchdowns on 21 attempts and Justin Crawford, who was injured before halftime, contributed another 42 yards and a touchdown on 7 carries. True Freshman Kennedy McKoy emerged, adding 99 yards on 4 carries. Daikiel Shorts hauled in 3 passes for 100 yards to lead the team in receiving, and Ka’Raun White added 67 yards on 7 catches. Jovon Durante has figured things out, finally, and had 83 yards on four receptions. Shelton Gibson was relatively quiet today, only getting 14 yards on four receptions.
The Mountaineers now turn their attention to TCU, as they welcome the Horned Frogs to Morgantown next Saturday at 3:30PM.