West Virginia Has a Problem at Quarterback...But It's a Good One

Entering fall camp, the quarterback battle was the one thing everyone had their eyes on in Morgantown. Three weeks in, and that's still the case as five guys remain alive heading into the team's biggest scrimmage of camp on Saturday.

If you had told me this back at the end of July, I would have thought, 'Oh boy, this isn't good. There must not be any options that are operating the offense well enough. In fact, it's been the exact opposite. There are five guys still in this race because all five have shown flashes of being capable of getting the job done. Yes, even redshirt freshman Khalil Wilkins and true freshman Scotty Fox Jr.

The performance of that group has really pleased head coach Rich Rodriguez, so much so that he dubbed the room the best on the entire roster.

"The deepest position group we got is quarterback," he said Thursday. "And that’s a good thing. Can’t have too many of those.”

He's right. You can't have too many of them. Over the last few years, the Mountaineers really struggled to develop their top options at QB, much less establish quality depth behind them.

Remember when Garrett Greene got injured in the Backyard Brawl? They had to take such a conservative approach because they didn't have a reliable option behind Nicco Marchiol. They couldn't afford to put him in harm's way and turn to Sean Boyle. Even with Ryder Burton as QB3 last year, there was a sense of nervousness about the strength of that group once Greene was on the shelf.

That should not be a concern whatsoever for Rich Rod and this staff with this group of quarterbacks this fall.

“I think they’ve all progressed," stated Rodriguez on Wednesday. "It’s really been quite a task to get so many guys so many reps, and we do get a lot of reps in practice, so I’m not concerned that they’re not getting enough, but we’re trying to be fair to all of them. It’s still a pretty good battle and in a good way. The scrimmage will probably mean a little bit more as far as that goes. We’ve got Saturday’s scrimmage and then kind of a half scrimmage next week, and you can tell the guys who’ve played a little bit, like Nicco (Marchiol) and Jaylen (Henderson), they’ve got some experience, and that’s helped them a little bit. Max (Brown) has got some experience. But Scotty Fox and Khalil (Wilkins) are really talented guys and have a good grasp as well. We’ll sit down as a staff after Saturday and really talk about where we’re at with those guys and other positions. I haven’t had a sit-down with the staff since the start of camp, as far as who is what and where at each position.”

Everyone's all focused on trying to figure out who the starting quarterback will be for the opener, but that's meaningless. Two or three quarterbacks should be getting reps in that game anyway, and depending on how they perform, that can change the staff's thinking for who they start the game with in Week 2 when they travel to Ohio. Tyler Huff didn't enter the season last year as the starter for Rodriguez at Jacksonville State, but he ended up being the guy and guided them to a nine-win season and a conference championship.

Don't spend too much time on who trots out their with the ones on August 30th. Instead, make your evaluations of the quarterbacks by what happens against Robert Morris. Regardless of who it is, having this much depth is a great problem to have.

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