5 reasons why West Virginia can make the College Football Playoff

3. Dana Holgersen

A longtime assistant under Mike Leach, Dana Holgersen has spent his coaching career as a disciple of the Air Raid offense. He was the offensive coordinator under Leach when Texas Tech’s passing attack set numerous records during the mid-2000’s and quickly parlayed that success into better coaching jobs at Houston and Oklahoma State. In his lone year at Oklahoma State, the Cowboys went 11-2 and set numerous school records for offense. Holgersen became one of the hottest young coaches in America.

After Rich Rodriguez had left the program in December of 2007, longtime assistant Bill Stewart was promoted from interim head coach after a 48-28 upset of No. 3 Oklahoma. Though the program went 9-3 each of the next two years and won a share of the 2010 Big East title, many felt Stewart was overmatched as the head coach. Athletic Director Oliver Luck (Andrew’s Father) believed in Holgersen and brought him in as offensive coordinator with a promise to be head coach by 2012 in his first major move at the helm. This arrangement naturally led to tension and Holgersen took over as head coach that summer. High expectations were met during Holgersen’s first year in Morgantown, capped off by a 70-33 Orange Bowl victory over Clemson. West Virginia left for the Big 12 after that year and hasn’t been to a major bowl since. The Mountaineers went 7-6 in 2012 and followed that up with 4-8, 7-6 and 8-5 seasons.

Dana Holgersen was considered to be on the hot seat coming into this season and has turned in arguably his finest coaching performance. Barring complete collapse, Holgersen’s job should now be safe. He’s recruited bigger linemen and running backs than his teams have in the past and has had success balancing the wide open Air Raid concepts with a run game that allowed the Mountaineer offense to be on the field for all but three plays of the third quarter in their recent game against TCU. He’s proving to be more than a good offensive coordinator and is a head coach succeeding in all aspects of the job. Their 2017 recruiting class is ranked fourth in the Big 12 and could rise once their success gets more publicity. 32 points per game is low for a Holgersen-coached team, but controlling the clock and a emphasizing an athletic defense has led to only allowing 17 points per outing. He has taken his lumps, but it appears Holgersen has built a winning football program of his own.