What’s been the weakest aspect of West Virginia’s team for the majority of the 2024 season figures to be tested in a major way at noon Saturday when the Mountaineers try to slow down a high-powered Texas Tech passing attack in the regular season finale for both teams from Jones AT&T Stadium.

The 14th meeting between the programs airs nationally on FS1, and the winner is assured of finishing ahead of the loser in the Big 12 Conference standings.

Both the Mountaineers (6-5, 5-3) and Red Raiders (7-4, 5-3) were eliminated from the conference championship race Friday when Colorado handled Oklahoma State.

While both teams are bowl eligible, a win would give West Virginia four victories over its last five games, a sixth Big 12 win in consecutive seasons for the first time and an unbeaten road record within the league — something the Mountaineers have yet to attain.

In this one, they’ll be out to keep up with a Tech team that leads the Big 12 in scoring offense (37.4 points per game) and surrenders a league-high 36.3 points.

“They’re one of the top teams in the country in number of snaps played. You have to be conscious of that early in the game, especially defensive line wise,” Brown said. “We’ll need to rotate early in the game and get more guys in. We’ve been playing four linebackers all year and that’s probably pretty good. Safety is where we don’t have a ton of depth.” 

For as potent as the Red Raiders are offensively, their pass defense has endured somewhat similar struggles to that of West Virginia.

The Red Raiders allow 309 yards on average through the air — the most of any Big 12 team. Due to the tempo at which Texas Tech’s offense operates, however, the Red Raiders are consistently forced to defend more plays than the average team. The 264 completions they’ve surrendered on 414 passing attempts are both tops in the Big 12.

Red Raider quarterback Behren Morton has completed 267-of-425 passes for 2,976 yards with 25 touchdowns and seven interceptions.

Brown believes it’s important for the Mountaineers to be disruptive early, particularly with the Red Raiders’ having scored 120 first-quarter points this season under head coach Joey McGuire.

“They start fast. Since coach McGuire has been there, they start fast, but even before he was there, that’s something they did a good job with,” Brown said. “They’re unique offensively and usually give you something different, whether it’s different play concept, pass, run, screen, different motions and different adjustments. You can try to practice the tempo they play at, but it’s hard.” 

West Virginia gives up nearly 261 passing yards on average, and though its pass defense was up to the task a week ago against a run-oriented Central Florida attack, the Mountaineers have too often been plagued by coverage busts leading to explosive plays, and sometimes scores, for the opposition.

“It’s a different animal. You’re talking about one of the best pass offenses in the country,” Brown said. 

Perhaps the biggest difference between the two teams as it pertains to pass defense is the ability to generate takeaways, with the Red Raiders having intercepted 12 passes to the Mountaineers’ four. West Virginia’s figure is tied with Cincinnati for the lowest mark in the Big 12, while Tech’s bettered by only three teams in the league.

“It starts with taking care of the ball. You can’t give up possessions. That’s No. 1,” Brown said. “No. 2, we have to play our game and can’t really get concerned about what they’re doing on offense. For us, it’s about first downs. We have to continue to move the chains and get first downs and those first downs will eventually lead to touchdowns.”

WVU snapped a four-game skid against Texas Tech last season, prevailing 20-13 in Morgantown despite managing 256 yards of total offense as Nicco Marchiol spelled an injured Garrett Greene. 

Greene will almost certainly need to lead a more productive offensive outing from WVU in Lubbock if the Mountaineers are to improve to 8-6 all-time against the Red Raiders.

The senior signal-caller will make his third consecutive start since returning from an injury November 16 against Baylor, and Saturday’s affair will mark his final regular season college game.

For the season, Greene has completed 131-of-236 passes for 1,707 yard with 12 touchdowns and nine interceptions, while rushing for 649 yards and five more scores.

Like the Mountaineers, Tech is far more successful limiting opposing run games, and the Red Raiders rank in the middle of the league with an average of 147 rushing yards allowed. However, Tech allows 4.5 yards per rush compared to WVU’s mark of 3.9.

For the Mountaineers, tailbacks Jahiem White and CJ Donaldson have rushed for 693 yards and 621, respectively. White has six rushing touchdowns and Donaldson adds nine.

On the flip side, WVU will try to limit the Big 12’s second-leading rusher in veteran Tech tailback Tahj Brooks. 

Brooks has surpassed 100 yards on the ground in all 11 outings this season and enters with 1,317 yards and 14 touchdowns.

“Their running back is an elite player,” Brown said. “Brooks has been in this league for a long time and he’s been really productive both in the run game and throw game.”

It took Brown until his fifth season and fifth try to defeat the Red Raiders, and he’s yet to win in Lubbock in either try, including a 48-10 drubbing in West Virginia’s most recent trip back in 2022.

Brown spent three seasons (2010-12) as offensive coordinator at Tech and has a strong understanding of a program that’s fielded one of the more explosive offenses on an almost annual basis for the last two decades.

“It goes back to Mike Leach. You’re talking about 20-plus years of really high-level offense,” Brown said. “There’s been some really good coaches go through there. That’s correct. This team here is balanced. Brooks is very unique. He’s averaging over 100 yards rushing, plus they get him the ball in the pass game. But that is in their DNA — the ability to throw the ball, and it’s been that way for 20-plus years. There’s been a lot of really good coaches and players, especially quarterbacks and receivers.”

Arizona was ready to turn the page on their tough two-game stretch against Wisconsin and Duke that resulted in the Wildcats almost falling out of the top 25.

While the results on the court weren’t great, those were still early tests for this Arizona team that is still needing to gel, so despite the losses, there wasn’t a whole lot of panic around the program based on the success they’ve had under head coach Tommy Lloyd.

The Wildcats looked like they had figured some things out on the practice floor prior to their Bahamas trip for the Battle 4 Atlantis tournament when they bludgeoned Davidson.

Arizona looked much more like themselves by attacking the glass to pull down 12 offensive rebounds, getting out in transition for 14 fastbreak points, and shooting at sizzling rate from the floor (56.5%), and from deep (50.0%).

But, with a championship appearance on the line, they fell in their next contest to Oklahoma.

The hard-fought five-point loss was disappointing, especially since they struggled to shoot the ball in back-to-back games, but again, this early season defeat could have been taken with a grain of salt.

That sentiment likely ended on Friday.

Arizona lost again, this time to West Virginia in an overtime heartbreaker that saw the Wildcats run out of steam in the extra period to lose, 83-76.

Early on, it looked like Arizona was going to showcase their form that earned them a preseason top 10 ranking.

They jumped out of the gates fast, taking an early seven-point lead five minutes into the game and extending it to eight with 12:42 left in the first half that stopped a little mini-run by West Virginia.

But the Mountaineers, who upset third-ranked Gonzaga just two days prior to this matchup, were able to tighten things up and take their second lead of the game with 8:46 left in the half.

That started a seesaw affair for the rest of the period where Arizona would try to pull away before West Virginia answered and eventually went into the locker room up 39-37.

The second half was a bit lower scoring.

In a role reversal, the Mountaineers were the ones trying to pull away from their opponent, but the Wildcats continued to answer even when they went down by multiple scores and double digits with under 10 minutes left in the contest.

A flurry to close things out where Trey Townsend made a layup and Caleb Love hit a 3-pointer to tie things up with 14 seconds left pushed Arizona into overtime.

Unfortunately, the extra period was where things got away from them.

With this loss, they are now under .500 with a 3-4 record.

Inconsistent shooting continues to plague Arizona, as they struggled from behind the arc again by going 7-21 from 3-point range for a 33.3% shooting clip.

Love and Townsend had big games with them scoring 24 and 19 points respectively, although the senior guard went 9-20 from the floor and 4-12 from three. KJ Lewis and Jaden Bradley joined them in double figures with 10 points each.

It wasn’t enough, though, as they struggled to stop Tucker DeVries who had a game-high 26 points, and Toby Okani who had 20.

Arizona will now travel back home from the Bahamas with even more questions than they had coming into this event.

They’ll return to the floor in game action on Dec. 7 as they take on Southern Utah at the McKale Center at 12 p.m. MST.

BOLT, W.Va. — A West Virginia sheriff’s deputy shot and killed a person on Friday who fired at him as he was responding to a 911 call, authorities say.

The individual who died wasn’t immediately identified by the Raleigh County Sheriff’s Office, which released a statement about the shooting on Facebook. It said officials were notifying next of kin.

Law enforcement responded to a residence in the community of Bolt, about 40 miles (64 kilometers) south of Charleston, West Virginia, at around 9 a.m. on Friday “following a 911 call reporting a mentally disturbed individual armed with a gun,” according to the sheriff’s office.

The first deputy to arrive was “immediately fired upon” and returned fire, killing the shooter, the statement said.

The officer was transported to a local hospital where he was treated for a gunshot wound that was not life-threating. Detectives with the sheriff’s office and the West Virginia State Police are investigating.