Why West Virginia Fans Should Not Panic About Another Huge Roster Reset

Over the last two years, West Virginia fans have had to relearn an entire football roster, thanks to the coaching change, and it taking place as late as it did to land on Rich Rodriguez.

The first roster overhaul made sense for fans, as it was expected and somewhat inevitable. This year's, though? It has some folks wondering if this is going to become the new norm, seeing 70-80 new faces. There's also concern that the Mountaineers will have a difficult time holding onto their best players.

While those fears are valid, I'm here to tell you, don't panic.

West Virginia University head coach Rich Rodriguez | Christopher Hall – West Virginia on SI

Roster attrition is inevitable. There's no way around it in the age of the transfer portal. For one reason or another, players are going to leave on their own accord, and in some instances may be shown the door by the coaching staff.

As we witnessed this offseason, sometimes those difficult conversations can happen with a very recognizable name. There's a standard that Rodriguez is going to hold every player to, and letting one player fall short of that is one too many.

But more behind this year's departures...to be frank, the Mountaineers aren't losing much production via the portal. Many of those transferring out saw limited to no playing time and weren't going to be in the team's plans in 2026. If I can just be brutally honest for a second, I call those guys roster fillers.

Yes, there were some roster holdovers from the Neal Brown regime, who are now on their way out, but I'm talking more so about the one-and-dones, the guys that transferred in last offseason and are already out the door — there's a bunch of them.

The portal was thinned out by the time Rodriguez got in town and began to put his staff together, which is why you saw so many of their additions come in the spring portal window, which no longer exists. They were here on a one-year agreement, giving them the opportunity to prove they belonged while also helping fill out certain positions. Take running back Tyler Jacklich, for example, who was literally added in the middle of fall camp.

Those types of things aren't going to happen in 2026 and beyond.

Rodriguez has been in place for a year now, and in that time, he's made serious progress on the recruiting trail, as proven evident in this large 2026 high school signing class. And because he was already in place with a full staff and knew exactly what the team needed, he was able to address it with quality additions from the portal. Last year, he was blindly guessing in a picked-over portal.

Many of this year's portal departures happened because Rodriguez knew he could find better, more experienced players, and he did. You may still choose to believe that West Virginia is going to lose its best players year after year, but you'd be buying into a false narrative created by those who expect the worst outcome in everything for no reason at all.

This roster is in much better shape than it was in 2025, although they are still probably one more offseason away from being able to assert themselves into the Big 12 title contention conversation.

While those fears are valid, I'm here to tell you, don't panic.

Those types of things aren't going to happen in 2026 and beyond.

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