Rick Trickett is Seeing Something He Likes from WVU's Offensive Line

It didn't take a trained eye last year to see that West Virginia had some major issues along the offensive line last fall. They had some okay moments in pass protection, but struggled mightily to fire off the ball and get any sort of push in the run game.

The good news? It's unlikely we'll see a repeat of that level of play in 2026. Veteran offensive line coach Rick Trickett reunited with Rich Rodriguez at WVU earlier this offseason and has essentially a brand new group of guys to work with.

It's still way too early to know how improved this unit will be, but so far, so good.

“I’m pleased," Trickett told reporters on Tuesday. "You bring guys in out of the portal, and they come from different programs and stuff, and I’ve only got two of them out there that really know what I really, really want and how far we got to go. There’s only two of them out there because they’ve been with me for two or three years. The rest of them are learning. I’d say we’re maybe a little bit ahead of where I thought we might be at this time. They have a willingness to work hard, and coming off of spring break, this is usually a bad practice, but I thought, as far as the group I have, I was pretty well pleased with them today.”

The two he is referring to are Cam Griffin and Amare "Bubba" Grayson, who played for Trickett and Rodriguez at Jacksonville State. Griffin is a versatile piece who has played all five positions along the offensive line, four of which he has more than 100 snaps at. He's played most at left guard (540 snaps) and left tackle (314). Meanwhile, Grayson will likely be in the mix for the starting job at right guard and was an All-Conference-USA selection last season.

It'll be a while before we get an evaluation on individual players, but right now, it's about the entire group raising the bar and understanding what it is that Trickett wants, which is largely based on having strong basic fundamentals.

“Yeah, I mean, I think we’re going to be better up front," Rich Rod stated on Tuesday. "Second year for some of the guys in the system. Coach (Rick) Trickett has been in the system for a long time, so he’s really comfortable at teaching what we want. Some of the new guys we got, we certainly think are making an impact. We got a couple really good freshmen that’ll be ready, I think, and then we got some transfers that are grown men.”