MORGANTOWN - The lesson for Drew Lock in the first game of his first full season as Missouri's starting quarterback was to lace his shoes tightly. The lesson for West Virginia linebacker Justin Arndt was to make sure his cell phone is charged.
Two vastly different takeaways were nevertheless smashed together during one play in the fourth quarter of Saturday's Mountaineers win over the Tigers. Arndt read the offensive line, raced around the corner and hit Lock so hard on a sack that the 6-foot-4, 205-pound sophomore came out of his right cleat.
"There were definitely a lot of people supporting me, tweeting me and texting me and all that stuff," Arndt said. "There was a lot of support from family and friends and people I don't even know who are just fans of Mountaineer Nation."
It was such an irresistible moment on the opening weekend of the college football season that the text messages and the notifications on his Twitter account were too much for Arndt's cell phone to handle.
"It took me a while to get to them all," he said. "My phone was dying. I had to take a break and charge it and come back. I just talked to my family, since they were all in town, and then came back to my phone."
It was the highlight play in the highlight day of Arndt's aged-but-young career. The 9-yard loss set the Tigers up for a 42-yard field goal, which Missouri's freshman kicker missed. Arndt would finish with eight tackles and two tackles for a loss. It was the first start of his career on the same day the Mountaineers used nine new starters and six first-time starters to defend 100 snaps.
Arndt, a fifth-year senior from Martinsburg, earned a scholarship in the spring of 2015. He remembered that it wasn't long ago when he didn't even feel like a part of the team when the walk-ons had to abide by the old rules and steer clear of the meals the players on scholarship were allowed to enjoy for free.
On Saturday, though, he played on 93 snaps and was named the team's defensive player of the game. When the linebackers met Sunday to review the film, Arndt was definitely part of the team. All of the linebackers were looking forward to the sack.
"As soon as that play came on, they were all saying, 'Oh-oh. Here it comes,' " said defensive coordinator Tony Gibson, who is the team's linebackers coach. "They were ready for it."
Lock, on the other hand, was not. He was working behind an offensive line that had a combined six starts, each belonging to the same player. The Tigers had two true freshmen and two walk-ons in their two-deep. WVU's 3-3-5 can be too sophisticated for sound and savvy offensive lines, and there was something about the third-down play that gave Arndt a clue he'd have a chance.
The tackles lined up in such a way that suggested the Tigers called a pass play. The right tackle squeezed in just a little, maybe a few inches more than normal, and Arndt assumed the protection was going to slide to the left. He was lined up across from that right tackle, and he knew if he'd guessed correctly, no one would get in his path to Lock.
The hardest part, it turned out, was keeping his blitz a secret.
As soon as the center moved the ball, Arndt raced around the corner and aimed his 5-foot-11, 210-pound body at Lock. Arndt can run fast and tackle securely, two reasons he was so valuable on special teams in the past, and now it's clear he can hit.
Lock never knew what was coming, even though Arndt pounced from the front. The surprise, the jolt Arndt delivered and the fact Lock lost a shoe were all testaments to how well Arndt timed his run and unleashed his hit.
The shock of it all was that Lock held onto the ball.
"It felt good just because it was clean," Arndt said. "He wasn't looking and honestly didn't see it coming."
If we're being honest, Arndt probably caught a lot of people off guard Saturday. Not himself, of course. He'll remind you he's been playing at this level since the beginning of spring practice. Gibson said throughout preseason camp that no one on defense was doing better work than Arndt.
But an undersized fifth-year senior? A special teams standout who'd just barely played on defense in the past? A starting spot that was maybe only opened when Xavier Preston was suspended for the opener? Was it wrong to be suspicious?
Seems like it.
"I think everyone knew here," Gibson said. "All of us knew - the coaches, the staff and the players - but I think the questions were more from the fans and the media. But we've been talking about the kid, and I think he did just what we thought he was going to do."