MORGANTOWN - More and more, it seems, folks look at major college football programs as businesses or corporations shrouded in secrecy. The coach is the CEO, the face that occasionally emerges from behind the curtain to give updates.
On Friday, however, WVU coach Dana Holgorsen allowed the Gazette-Mail behind the curtain for a peek as the Mountaineers move toward their Sept. 3 opening game against Missouri.
The look piggybacked a tour arranged for the Mountaineers' Century Club, steered by Dale Wolfley, coordinator of the school's Varsity Club. Members of the Century Club, like Little General Store, Inc., President Greg Darby, are very good friends indeed of the athletic department. Some, like Wayne Richards of Houston, flew into Morgantown for the weekend event. All paid $5,000 to attend coaches meetings, visit practices, hear presentations and attend dinners and parties. There are roughly 30 members, and the approximately $150,000 raised is earmarked specifically for the football program.
After lunch with the players, Century members toured the visiting locker room. Then all were led into the back row of the team meeting room.
There, Holgorsen kicked off a meeting of actual preparation for the season. It was quite an eye-opener for "the old men in the back," as Holgorsen jokingly introduced the visitors.
First, the Mountaineers filed in not to pop or rap, but country music.
Then, when the music stopped, the players saw the kickoff and punt depth charts displayed on the big screen.
Also listed were points of emphasis for the entire team in 2016: critical downs, finishing drives, yards per play, turnovers and field position. It was explained that the team finished but 6-6-1 last season in the latter.
Holgorsen then gave way to special teams coach Mark Scott, who was impressive in his presentation. Using a red laser pointer, he went through plays and alignments culled both from recent practices and last season's games.
Each play or formation was labeled at the bottom of the screen. An example: "Blue fan - E. Battle." Scott would instruct the players on the objective, positioning and point out what was done correctly or incorrectly on the video. (A graduate assistant coach manned the computer and went back and forth at Scott's direction.) The player of emphasis in the aforementioned example was junior college transfer Elijah Battle.
Scott was impressive not only in his knowledge, but also in the way he recognized every player on each play shown. In almost a pop-quiz fashion, he'd then occasionally ask the player to pipe up and answer a question or confirm his understanding of a lesson.
Details of the plays or formation won't be revealed, but on that day Scott was going over many special-teams objectives like "return middle," etc.
Throughout the meeting there were terms thrown around like "pad level," "splits" and "bucket step."
You heard sentences like, "Nana [Kyeremeh], you have backside contain." You heard Scott implore a player to "squeeze the air out of it." And you heard him tell Sean Walters to, hey, "go ahead and 2-gap it."
The session went a full hour, which Holgorsen later said he didn't mind, even though it eliminated the afternoon's position meetings. Practice was at 4 p.m.
What those observing had to walk away with is a better understanding of the complexity of the game and the various responsibilities of the players. Battle, for instance, must know his various special-teams duties, but also all of those involved with defense. Remember, the junior is trying to get work at cornerback.
"Until people really sit in on it, they don't understand everything," said WVU defensive coordinator Tony Gibson. "They just think we roll out a ball and say, 'Go play.' But there's a lot more meeting time and things people don't realize."
Gibson has coached everywhere from Gilmer High School to Michigan, Pitt and Arizona.
"This is as good as I've ever been around, the way we structure it, the way we practice during the week," he said. "I feel our kids are really fresh on game day. Plus, the facility and setup, all we've done since I've been back, is a great setup for our kids. It's a great learning environment for them."
Yes, by the way, Gibson was asked about his defense.
"It's coming together well," he said. "The kids are responding to what we've been doing. They're anxious, especially on the defensive side. There are a lot of guys that need to prove themselves - and I think they're hungry right now."
Whispers heard from within are the starting cornerbacks might just end up being not one, but two transfers: Antonio Crawford from Miami and Maurice Fleming from Iowa.
Oh, and Kyzir White? Is he running with the No. 1 defense?
"At the spur, yes," Gibson said. "He looks good. He's learning, getting better every day. He's making plays. Anytime we have 'live' situations, that's when he shows up because he's so physical. I like the way he plays and the effort [with which he plays]. He's a student of the game. We're counting on him to be making plays."
Unfortunately for Gibson, his best playmaker, free safety Dravon Askew-Henry, is out for the season.
"Jeremy Tyler is a guy that, two years ago, battled Dravon for the same spot," said the DC. "Right now the best move for us is to move Jeremy there [from bandit]. I don't want to move [Jarrod] Harper or Kyzir [White] or any of those guys because they are locked into a certain spot. Jeremy is athletic enough that he can play any of the three safety spots. Right now we feel the best chance for us is putting him at free safety."
Gibson admitted to being a little nervous with his untested defense.
"Oh yeah," he said. "You don't know how they're going to react once the lights go on."
On Friday, however, we saw how they reacted with the lights out and the video rolling. And that, certainly, was impressive.
Contact Mitch Vingle at 304-348-4827 or mitchvingle@wvgazettemail.com. Follow him on Twitter @MitchVingle.