West Virginia vs. Texas Tech: Sorry WVU Fans, Defense DOES Win Championships

The West Virginia Mountaineers have met their match. The Texas Tech Red Raiders knocked off the highest ranked Big 12 team in the country, and the hopeful national title contender from the conference Saturday.

Mountaineers fans now understand that defense does win championships.

Texas Tech beat the Mountaineers 49-14 on Saturday in a game that was owned by the Red Raiders from kickoff. 

As good as Geno Smith has been for the Mountaineers, the West Virginia secondary has been that much worse. The Mountaineers defense was ranked No. 102 in total defense, and No. 117 in pass defense heading into this Saturdays game.

After giving up 673 yards to Seth Doege and the Red Raiders, they will surely drop further. 499 yards came from the arm of Doege.

There was a lot of hope placed in this Mountaineers team this season. After a big start to the season for Geno Smith, most believed that he could be the next Heisman Trophy winner. Now he will have to settle for only a trip to New York.

Smith was completing 81.4 percent of his passes heading into this game, but the Raiders kept bringing pressure and confused coverage for Smith. It led to him completing just over 50 percent of his passes. There is no real rushing attack at West Virginia, so once Smith was neutralized, the Red Raiders had a game.

The Red Raiders used something called defense to win this football game. Sure, Doege had a great game for Texas Tech scorching the West Virginia defense, but what quarterback hasn’t? West Virginia has played this same way all season and the gamble finally ended.

The Mountaineers have given up over 35 points per game to their opponents. West Virginia allowed for Marshall to score 34 in the season opener. That should have been the sign this team couldn’t win it all.

A common pivot point to the "defense wins championships" chat is that Cam Newton and Auburn won the national title in 2010 without defense. A lot of folks obviously missed that season as Auburn finished with No. 14 rushing defense and No. 40 total defense in the country.

The Tigers also ranked No. 46 that year in scoring defense, only allowing 21.33 points per game.

It is well known how good the Alabama defense was a year ago and in 2009, but what about Florida in 2008?

Surprisingly, the Tebow-led national champion Florida Gators were No. 19 in total defense in 2008. They were also No. 4 in scoring, No. 20 in rushing and No. 21 in passing defense.

The ’08 Gators were only No. 47 total offense in the country; defense wins championships.

The Big 12 has become known as an offensive league, but the last national title winner from the conference came in 2005 with Texas. Before that it was Oklahoma in 2000—a strong defensive team.

Looking at the other national title winners since 2000, all have been very strong defensive teams.

The Mountaineers have to find a way to get better on defense. The scheme may be a place to start, but there are a lot of needs for the West Virginia defense. Playing in the Big 12 doesn’t mean you can’t be good against the pass.

Look at Oklahoma this season. The Sooners are ranked No. 9 against the pass. The Sooners are having a lot of success and it culminated with a dominate defensive win Saturday against Texas.

There is a model for West Virginia to follow, they just have to get there. Don’t dump the offense, just get better on defense.

There doesn't appear to be anyway for this team to turn the corner defensively this season. That may be one of the most frustrating developments for Mountaineers fans, but this team is not far away from being a title contender.

West Virginia has one of the best offenses in the country; there is no denying the Dana Holgerson led squad that. They do have issues defensively and before that changes, there won’t be any national titles running through Morgantown, W.Va.

Sorry Mountaineers, offense looks pretty, but defense wins championships. 

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