West Virginia Mountaineers Vs. Texas Longhorns Preview - Season 124 Episode 9: The One We Need For College Gameday

The Mountaineers travel to Austin with a potential visit from ESPN College GameDay looming next week. Will West Virginia mess with Texas again, or will the human freight train known as D'Onta Foreman spoil the fun?

By JohnLowe24@JohnEverett24 Nov 11, 2016, 1:02pm EST

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OPENING THOUGHTS

First off, I want to start off by noting that this is actually the 124th season of WVU football, not the 125th (since there were no football seasons in 1892 or 1918). Thank you for pointing that out to me.

Okay, real stuff now. If you didn’t catch it (because of the election or the ‘super-exciting’ Penguins-Oilers game), the College Football Playoff released their rankings again and once again, WVU is severly under-ranked.

The second #CFBPlayoff Selection Committee rankings.

A photo posted by College Football Playoff (@cfbplayoff) on Nov 8, 2016 at 4:18pm PST

Yeah. More disrespect.

How did Texas A&M not fall further? How are Penn State and Colorado ranked that high? How in the world is Virginia Tech, with losses to Tennessee and Syracuse, ranked above WVU?!? I just don’t get it.

It is also worth noting that if both WVU and Oklahoma win this weekend, it is very likely that ESPN College Gameday will return to Morgantown. The only other real possibility is Washington State at Colorado, so keep an eye on Colorado-Arizona and Washington State-Cal to see how that plays out.

From here on out with the season, I will be adding two new sections at the end of the preview. It will show what needs to happen for the remainder of the Big 12 season and that needs to happen across the country this week to ensure the best possible outcome for the Mountaineers.

We all know that wins are vital, so there’s no point in saying so. There’s no point in saying that WVU really needs to win because this could be a trap game. We all know this. So I’m not going to go on about it. Check out the two bottom sections and feel free to comment on what I think.

WHEN/WHERE

Date: Saturday, November 12th

Kickoff Time: Noon ET/11:00 AM CT

Where: Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium, Austin, TX

Tickets: General Public

WATCH/LISTEN

TV: FS1

Streaming Video: FoxSportsGO (or the FoxSportsGO app for smartphones)

Radio: WZST Variety 101 (100.9 FM in Morgantown) and the Mountaineer Sports Network from IMG (Radio Affiliates)

Streaming Audio: Locate the Mountaineers Sports Network from IMG on TuneIn Radio (or the TuneIn app for smartphones)

Satellite Radio: Sirius 188; XM 200

THREADS

West Virginia:

Texas:

ODDS

Spread: WVU by 1.5-2

O/U: 64

Bill C:

Spread (Home)	S&P+ Projection	Margin	Win Prob.	S&P+ Pick (ATS)	F/+ Projection	F/+ Pick (ATS)
-2	Texas (33.0-32.3)	0.6	51.4%	West Virginia	West Virginia by 2.3	West Virginia

THE ENEMY

Where are they from? Austin, Texas

Series History: WVU leads the series 3-2.

Last Time: West Virginia 38, Texas 20

SB Nation Blog: Burnt Orange Nation

Record: 5-4 (3-3 Big 12)

Head Coach: Charlie Strong (for a few more weeks…)

KEYS TO THE GAME

D’ONTA FOREMAN, D’ONTA FOREMAN, D’ONTA FORMAN! Foreman averages 7 yards per carry and leads the Big 12 in rushing. WVU needs to focus on rush defense if they want to win this game.
Take advantage of the Longhorns’ awful defense. Texas allows an average of 36.5 points per game against Power 5 teams.

HOW AFRAID SHOULD WE BE (ON A SCALE OF 1-10)?

I would say 7. This team is heating up and Charlie Strong is fighting for his job. Also, the fact that the game is in Austin will work in the Longhorns’ favor. It will be a sneaky close game. They’ve got absolutely nothing to lose. They’ve been down before and you could say it’s been liberating for them.

PREDICTION THAT WILL BE WRONG

I believe after the first half, the rush defense will eventually get a handle of Foreman. I think Texas is a dangerous team, but not more talented than WVU. I think that the Mountaineers will just squeak out a win in Austin.

West Virginia 31, Texas 28

WHAT WE NEED TO HAPPEN IN THE BIG 12 ASSUMING WE WIN OUT

November 12^th

Iowa State at Kansas (Doen’t really matter, I’m going to assume that the Cyclones win this one)

Baylor at Oklahoma (Oklahoma. If we want College Gameday, we want this.)

Texas Tech at Oklahoma State (Oklahoma State)

November 19^th

Texas at Kansas (I’m going to assume that if we win against the Longhorns, we’ll win close. So we want Texas to win the remainder of their games to justify that close game)

Kansas State at Baylor (Kansas State. We only beat them by one, so we want them to look decent at the end of the season.)

Oklahoma State at TCU (Oklahoma State)

Texas Tech at Iowa State (Doesn’t really matter, I’m going to assume Texas Tech will win though)

November 25^th

TCU at Texas (Texas)

Baylor vs. Texas Tech (Texas Tech)

November 26^th

Kansas at Kansas State (Kansas State)

December 3^rd

Kansas State at TCU (Kansas State)

Oklahoma State at Oklahoma (Oklahoma. Since the Cowboys would be tied with WVU in the Big 12 standings up to this point and also holding the head-to-head match up, the Mountaineers can’t lock up the Sugar Bowl bid)

FINAL STANDINGS ASSUMING THAT HAPPENS

West Virginia (8-1, 11-1) [WVU wins the head-to-head over Oklahoma]
Oklahoma (8-1, 9-3)
Oklahoma State (7-2, 9-3)
Kansas State (6-3, 8-4)
Texas (5-4, 7-5)
Texas Tech (4-5, 6-6)
TCU (3-6, 5-7) [TCU wins the head-to-head over Baylor]
Baylor (3-6, 6-6)
Iowa State (1-8, 2-10)
Kansas (0-9, 1-11)

WHAT WE NEED TO HAPPEN ACROSS THE COUNTRY THIS WEEK

We need total chaos above, so here are some games to keep an eye on this week. I’m abstaining Clemson because they’re playing Pitt and under no circumstances will I advocate rooting for Pitt, even if WVU benefits from it.

Mississippi State at No. 1 Alabama (Another upset please!)

No. 3 Michigan at Iowa (Not likely, but we can dream right?)

No. 20 USC at No. 4 Washington (USC is out of playoff contention, and Washington would probably tank due to their SOS)

No. 5 Ohio State at Maryland (Maryland is the lesser of two evils in this matchup)

Wake Forest at No. 6 Louisville (Do it for Arnie, Wake!)

Illinois at No. 7 Wisconsin (Lovie Smith needs to start paying off eventually)

Ole Miss at No. 8 Texas A&M (FINISH HIM!!)

No. 9 Auburn at Georgia (Beat the Tigers now, so that way an Auburn Iron Bowl win would be a bigger upset)

No. 10 Penn State at Indiana (OVER-RATED!!!!!)

No. 12 Colorado at Arizona (Richie Rich, help a brother out!)

Georgia Tech at No. 14 Virginia Tech (We’ll be rooting against the Hokies anyway...)

ENJOY THE WEEKEND, BY-GODDERS!!!