West Virginia Football: The 5 Toughest Tests of the 2011 Season

The Dana Holgorsen era at West Virginia will officially begin one year earlier than expected, amid both excitement and a little bit of turmoil.

The transition from ousted head coach Bill Stewart to his media-maligned replacement certainly didn’t go smoothly. But hey, at least it saved us all the trouble of having to endure one awkward season that was set to be characterized by an internal power struggle.

I can't speak for the rest of Mountaineer Nation, but color me excited for the beginning of Holgorsen’s head coaching tenure in Morgantown.

The Stewart era left Mountaineer fans with an empty feeling inside and it’s time for the newly appointed offensive guru to fill it.

West Virginia has already established itself as a consistent conference contender, and with Holgorsen now guiding the ship, it looks as if the Mountaineers should be one of the teams to beat for the foreseeable future.

The Big East is expected to be much improved after last year’s embarrassing debacle, so Holgorsen and the rest of the gold and blue crew will have their work cut out for them in 2011.

This year’s slate is by no means grueling but it's also far from easy.

Sure, you can count Norfolk State and Bowling Green in the win column already, but besides them, no other opponents should be taken lightly.

West Virginia will have to survive more than a few battles this season, but there are five contests in particular that are shaping up be the most challenging. 

Here's a look at the five toughest games on West Virginia's 2011 schedule.

5. At Cincinnati: Nov. 12

Cincinnati’s short-lived run of Big East dominance unceremoniously came to an end when coach Brian Kelly skipped town for the bigger and brighter pastures of South Bend last December.

At times last season, the Bearcats looked flat out lost under new coach Butch Jones, ultimately finishing with a 4-8 record, a far cry from the 12-0 regular season they posted in Kelly’s final year.

The offense no longer looked like the well-oiled juggernaut that steamrolled through opponents in 2009 but it was the defense that was the main culprit of the downfall.

The inexperience and youth on Cincinnati's defense was glaring but all the lumps that were taken in 2010 could pay dividends this year, as 10 starters are back, including star LB J.K. Schaffer, who posted 111 tackles.

If you want to stop Cincinnati, it starts with shutting down Zach Collaros and Isaiah Pead, one of the best QB-RB combos in the Big East.

Pead, who averaged 6.6 yards per carry last season, is a dangerous weapon when he has the ball in his hands and he’ll need to be the main focus of West Virginia’s defense. 

4. At Maryland: Sep. 17

Maryland may not be the most intimidating opponent on this year’s schedule, but I have to admit, this could be the game that scares me the most.

This game just screams look ahead, as the big matchup with LSU looms one week later and the Terrapins are not the type of team that you can just use as a tune up.

New head coach Randy Edsall saw plenty of West Virginia during his time at Connecticut, so he’ll have a pretty good idea of what he’s up against and you better believe that there will be a solid blueprint in place to slow down the West Virginia attack.

Be careful using last year’s dominant 31-17 victory as a barometer for where both of these teams stand, because Maryland’s most important player, QB Danny O’Brien, didn’t even take a snap in that game.

O’Brien could be the best quarterback the ACC has to offer this season and he won’t be easy to stop.

The sophomore signal-caller had the Maryland offense averaging 32 points per game in 2010.

The Terps defense returns seven starters, including LB Kenny Tate, one of the top defensive difference makers in the country, along with fellow LB Demetrius Hartsfield and DT Joe Vellano, two rising stars in the ACC.

Maryland may not have fared all that well the last three times these teams have met, but the Terps shouldn’t be taken lightly. 

3. Vs. Pittsburgh: Nov. 25

Right now, we don’t whether the Todd Graham-Dana Holgorsen feud is being overblown or understated. All we know is that the Backyard Brawl just got even more interesting and even more intense.

The two new head coaches weren’t the best of friends when they were facing off against each other in Conference USA—Holgorsen as the offensive coordinator at Houston, and Graham as the head man at Tulsa—and it seems that the bad blood is about to spill over into the Big East.

Graham takes over a Pittsburgh team that annually underachieved under former head coach Dave Wannstedt, so the expectations have been diminished somewhat. But make no mistake about it, the Panthers definitely have the talent to make a run at a Big East championship.

The defense, led by DE Brandon Lindsey and S Jarred Holley, should be the league’s best this year. And although the offense loses RB Dion Lewis and WR Jonathan Baldwin, the proper replacements like Ray Graham and Devin Street are in place, ready to take over.

These two teams have taken turns breaking each other’s hearts, as Pitt dashed West Virginia’s hopes of a national title game berth in 2007 with one of the most shocking upsets in college football history only to have the favor paid back in 2009 when the Mountaineers destroyed the Panthers’ dreams of a Big East championship on a last second field goal.

These two teams are only separated by an hour-and-a-half drive on I-79 but in that small amount of space, there’s a ton of hatred and contempt which has been brewing for decades. 

There will be no love lost when these two meet in Morgantown the day after Thanksgiving.

2. At South Florida: Dec. 1

In recent years, Raymond James Stadium has proved to be a black hole of sorts for West Virginia.

The last two times that the Mountaineers have gone down to Tampa with a top 20 ranking, they’ve left with defeated on both occasions.

The Bulls had an up-and-down campaign in coach Skip Holtz’s first year as head coach, finishing with an 8-5 record, and they look to be the league’s hardest team to forecast this year.

South Florida only returns 11 starters but the team has talent all over the field.

It all starts with QB B.J. Daniels, a valuable dual-threat weapon that can be a nightmare to try to prepare for and then ultimately contain when it comes to crunch time.

The defense loses some key cogs like DT Terrell McClain, LB Jacquian Williams and S Mistral Raymond, who were all picked in this year’s NFL Draft. But the unit returns an abundance of emerging playmakers, including linebackers DeDe Lattimore and Sam Barrington, DE Ryne Giddins and S Jon Lejiste.

Add that to the fact that RB Darrell Scott could make the biggest impact out of all the incoming newcomers to the Big East this season and you can see why the last thing that West Virginia will want to have to do is take a trip down to Tampa to finish off a long season.

1. Vs. LSU: Sep. 24

This one’s it. This is the statement game.

After putting up a marginally tough fight down at Tiger Stadium last year, the Mountaineers will now welcome the top-five ranked LSU Tigers to Morgantown for a late September showdown that promises to offer up a ton of drama, unlike last year’s 20-14 let down.

The LSU offense should be greatly improved under the guidance of new coordinator Steve Kragthorpe and QB Jordan Jefferson has had a season to mature, so he should be prepared to handle big showcases such as this one.

QB Geno Smith and the rest of the West Virginia offense will have had three games to get adapted to Holgorsen’s Air Raid attack but that doesn’t necessarily mean that the unit will be prepared enough to go toe-to-toe with one of the nation’s toughest defenses.

Throwing the ball on Morris Claiborne and Tyrann Mathieu, one of the best cornerback duos in the country, won’t exactly be easy, so the Mountaineers had better hope that a running back has emerged by this point in the season, because running the ball and controlling the clock will be paramount.

LSU should be favored by at least a touchdown for this one, but I’ve personally witnessed what kind of craziness can commence when the lights go on at Mountaineer Field, so there’s no reason to think West Virginia doesn’t have a shot in this one.

There’s no doubt that the Tigers have the bigger, stronger and much faster roster, but Jordan Jefferson still hasn’t convinced me that he can handle a big spot like this and coach Les Miles is due to have some of his crazy calls backfire on him in a big game.