West Virginia’s Top 10 All-Time Wins

Football season is just around the corner and to help you get fired up for its return, I thought we could take a look back at some of the best wins in West Virginia program history. I’m sure you will all agree exactly with all ten of my selections and the order in which they appear.

Here. We. Go.

Just two years removed from the game no one wants to talk about, West Virginia got its revenge on Pitt in the Backyard Brawl. Sure, it wasn’t a game that kept them out of a national championship, but it did keep them from going to a BCS game. Also, many of the players that were involved in that ’07 game were still in the program and were able to get their payback.

The Hokies entered this matchup a perfect 6-0 and had their sights set on a national championship. No one, including the Hokies, expected a 2-4 West Virginia team to show up and dominate one of the nation’s best teams. That loss sent Virginia Tech into a spiral, losing four of its final six games. WVU would go on to win five of its last six.

West Virginia lost 27 straight games to Penn State in addition to one tie prior to this game. Nearly 30 years went by before the Mountaineers saw themselves on the right side of the score against the dominant Penn State Nittany Lions. This ended up being one of Joe Paterno’s worst teams, but still, this was a moment Mountaineer fans had been waiting for for almost three decades.

“They got Flutie!” – one of the most iconic calls by Jack Fleming. West Virginia’s defense came up strong late in the game and running back John Gay ran in the go-ahead touchdown which would ultimately be the game-winner. WVU fizzled out at the end of the season, but at the time this was a gigantic win for the Old Gold and Blue.

The season-opener in 1982 was expected to be a blowout loss on the road against a top-10 Oklahoma team. The Mountaineers had a very young team and had Penn State transfer Jeff Hostetler at quarterback. That day, he made a name for himself and led WVU to a signature 41-27 win over the Sooners. Hostetler threw for 321 yards and four touchdowns that afternoon.

If you have this one higher on your list, I can’t blame you. To this day, this game featured the largest crowd ever to attend a football game at Mountaineer Field with 70,222 spectators on hand. WVU ripped off nine straight wins to open the season, but this was by far their stiffest challenge yet. Miami had a loaded roster and were playing for a national title berth as well. Robert Walker’s 19-yard touchdown with six minutes and change to go was the deciding factor.

SEC speed. That’s all WVU heard about during the month of bowl prep. How could a team from the Big East hang with the speed and athleticism of Georgia? Ask the Bulldogs how this one went. The young duo of Pat White and Steve Slaton caught the nation’s attention with this Sugar Bowl win. WVU caught Georgia off guard and jumped out to a 28-0 lead just a few minutes into the second quarter. The Bulldogs battled back, but were unable to complete the comeback. Phil Brady’s fake punt rush for a first down went down as one of the top plays in program history.

The win over Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl is a moment Mountaineer fans will never forget. West Virginia lost out on a national championship appearance after falling to a four-win Pitt team and then shortly after, lost head coach Rich Rodriguez to Michigan. WVU fans were crushed and lost so much hope in such a short amount of time. Every college football analyst picked Oklahoma to crush West Virginia because of everything the team just went through mentally. They and 84% of the country were wrong. WVU came out with a point to prove and handled the Sooners 48-28. The “leave no doubt” pregame speech from Bill Stewart gives Mountaineer fans chills to this very day.

Perfection is not easy. It’s happened just twice in the history of the program and this win over Boston College sealed the deal for an undefeated campaign in 1993. They had to earn this one with backup QB Darren Studstill leading the way. He engineered a 77-yard scoring drive and just as BC threatened to answer, Steve Perkins forced a fumble which was recovered by Mike Logan. Studstill threw up a jumpball to Ed Hill in the end zone who came down with the game-winning catch. WVU should have secured a spot in the national championship game once again, but a one-loss Florida State team got in instead.

I’ll be honest, it’s very hard to peg the best win of all-time. You could make a case for really any of these victories I have listed in the top five. But I’m going with the ’88 win over Syracuse. Why? It gave West Virginia it’s first-ever perfect season. The first time you do something of that magnitude, it has to be recognized as the top moment in program history, at least until you win a national title. WVU had a fairly favorable schedule to this point in the season, but Syracuse was no slouch by any means. West Virginia silenced all the doubters pounding Syracuse and securing a spot in the Fiesta Bowl to take on Notre Dame for the national championship. The other wins were great, but can you really put anything else above the one that punched your ticket to the title game? I don’t think so.

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