Neal Brown Wants His Team to Ignore the 'Noise' and 'Negativity'
"Losing stinks." Those were the first two words of Neal Brown's opening statement on Tuesday. From the first two words until the very end of the press conference, Brown expressed his disappointment and frustration with WVU's 0-2 start to the season.
You can look at the two losses and say, well, if these three or four plays don't happen, the Mountaineers are 2-0. The problem is, those plays did happen and they continue to happen year after year. Whether it's dropping a pass, turning the ball over, failing to recover any of the four fumbles that hit the turf, a false start on 3rd and 1 inside the 10, or a clear roughing the passer penalty, it's always something. This team just can't get out of its own way.
Despite losing the season opener to Pitt in the fashion that they did, WVU's confidence had to be in a pretty good spot heading into Week 2. The offense put up 31 on what is considered to be a very good defense and it was a game they should have won on the road against a top-25 opponent. The loss to Kansas, however, is a whole different feeling. For years the Jayhawks have been the doormat of the Big 12 and although they are an improved team, that perception still exists.
Since last Saturday, fans have been clamoring for the firing of Neal Brown. He's 17-20 through three-plus seasons and has failed to make any significant progress since taking the job in 2019. Neal Brown hears the noise although he's done his best to ignore it.
"Negativity is never good, but hey, it is what it is. This is big-time football. There's pros and cons to it. The thing is, if you're affected by outside noise now, you're going to be affected your whole life. You try to teach them life lessons along the way and this is it. Our message when we came back on Sunday was we've got to have a singular focus. When you have adversity two things happen. You either come together and you really learn from it and you grow from it and you look back and say hey, that's where we really got the thing turned. Or it splinters. So it's up to us, everybody that's in the program right now to really draw near and get better.
"It's harder for the kids than it is me. Like, I just turn off social media and I'm fine. I'm actually feeling a whole hell of a lot better when I don't have it. It's easy for me, but I'm 42. But that's not the negativity that I'm necessarily worried about because you never take criticism you wouldn't go to for advice. The noise that hurts is, man, y'all are so close. You could be 2-0. Yeah, we could be but we're not. Let's focus on why we're not and getting that corrected. We could be sitting here 2-0. We could be. I could also be an NFL player if I was a little faster. That's kind of what it is."
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