LANDOVER, Md. - Maybe Ka'Raun White was correct after all.
You remember. BYU surely knew.
Earlier in the week, White, WVU's 6-foot-1 wideout, spoke of the Cougars' secondary thusly:
"Their corners, I don't think they can run with us. They look solid, but they don't look like they can keep up," he said.
Turns out he was right. But maybe not in the way White meant.
You see, BYU couldn't keep up with the waves of receivers West Virginia threw at the Cougars. If you watched the game, you saw that Mountaineer quarterback Skyler Howard finally connected with speedster Jovon Durante. In fact, he did so six times.
Howard also connected with old reliable Daikiel Shorts. He really, really connected with Shelton Gibson for a whopping 144 yards.
But then the QB hit White. And Devonte Mathis. And Gary Jennings.
He connected with backs Justin Crawford. And Kennedy McKoy. Heck, even Elijah Wellman caught one for 4 yards.
In all, Howard hooked up with 10 receivers in the Mountaineers' 35-32 win here at FedExField before 38,207 in what was considered a home game for WVU.
The group accounted for 332 yards and a 10.7 average.
So, yeah, Ka'Raun, they couldn't keep up.
Of course, as you might imagine after providing the proverbial "bulletin board" material, White wasn't made available to the press after the win.
But Gibson was.
"We talk about it every single day in practice," Gibson said. "We have the best receiving corps in the nation. Every single day we try to prove it. Every step."
Gibson, as has been the case, was the Mountaineers' best deep threat. He had a long of 51 and led WVU in receiving. But a good sign was West Virginia was able to spread the ball around.
"We wanted to get Jovon's confidence back up," Gibson said "We saw he was a little down in the games before. We told him there are a lot of games left and that he's a baller, so just go out there and play."
"It was good to see Jovon get going early," said WVU coach Dana Holgorsen. "He touched the ball early. Shelton continues to be strong for us. There's Ka'Raun. He dropped a ball, but that's going to happen periodically. He didn't pick an opportune time to do it, but I have a lot of confidence in him and we went right back to him. If he hadn't have been tripped up he would have scored and the game would have been over. He continues to be a guy we rely on.
"Our backs are getting involved in the passing game as well. You saw Crawford and Kennedy make a couple plays. Those guys are threats and we'll continue to go to them."
White almost was the game's goat after making the statement and then dropping the ball at the line of scrimmage toward the game's end.
But he came back and drew a pass interference penalty on BYU's Chris Wilcox.
WVU needed all the offense it could get. Its defense allowed 521 yards and seemingly couldn't close until Maurice Fleming pulled in a tipped pass for an interception.
It seems that will be the story going forward. WVU's offense will have to score and score and score. On Saturday, however, the Mountaineers did what hoops teams do in the NCAA basketball tournament.
They survived and advanced - to 3-0.
Contact Mitch Vingle at 304-348-4827 or mitchvingle@wvgazettemail.com. Follow him on Twitter @MitchVingle.