Former WVU RB Eugene Napoleon Makes Bold Prediction for 2026 Mountaineers

The bar is set much higher for the West Virginia Mountaineers in 2026 despite only winning four games in year one of Rich Rodriguez's return.

It may not result in a run at the Big 12 crown, but there is certainly more optimism surrounding this team, thanks to the work the coaching staff did in the transfer portal and in high school recruiting, landing a top 15 class nationally. With a little over a week left until the first game, Rich Rod still seems fairly pleased with how the team has been practicing and the intensity they play with every day, which fuels the hype train even more.

In our The Walk Thru Game Day Show preseason kickoff special, I asked former Mountaineer running back Eugene Napoleon what his expectations are for this team, and he was not shy about expressing his confidence in this bunch.

“The floor is 7-5. Looking at the schedule and seeing what West Virginia has on this roster, there is no conceivable way they don’t go at least 8-4," he said. “With the talent that West Virginia has, it doesn’t matter who you’re playing; you know what you have, and you know what you are. It all comes down to coaching it. I know it sounds arrogant; I really do. I know how it sounds. Do you know who said we were going to be undefeated and playing for a national championship in early August about that ’88 team? Beano Cook. Beano Cook came to a handful of practices; he said it, and people thought he was out of his mind. I’m not saying West Virginia is going undefeated. What I’m saying is when you know what you have at each key position, now the only thing you have to do is coach ‘em up because you have the talent. Imagine if we reverse-engineered this. Imagine if you had great coaching and you don’t have the talent. Now you’re talking…they squeezed out six wins; they just don’t have the talent, but they have great coaching. Now, they have the talent, so all you have to focus on is getting them coached up, and I believe he can do that.”

It was a major uphill battle last year for WVU because of the level of talent they had populating the two-deep. That's why flipping the roster again is not as big of a deal as the national pundits make it out to be. They had to flip it again, and this time around, landed a much better caliber player out of the portal across the board.

As Gene has always said, "Rich has won everywhere he's been," and in year two, he averages 7.7 wins, so if we're just going simply by the numbers, 8-4 doesn't sound all that crazy. Gene may be a little more confident in this year's team than I am, but I do agree that WVU now has the talent to win games and exceed expectations.

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