MORGANTOWN — Through a rough stretch of Big 12 games, where West Virginia lost five-straight, WVU would be down a couple of scores, and it didn’t feel like the Mountaineers had a chance of coming back. The offense wasn’t capable of committing a comeback.
Saturday against Arizona State, WVU was down two scores, 22-10, heading into the fourth quarter, but now, it felt like the Mountaineers had a chance, because true freshman Scotty Fox Jr. was behind center.
Fox has been the starter for five games now, and was only picked because Rich Rodriguez was out of options at quarterback with all the injuries, but in the last couple of games, he made his case to be the full-time starter for the rest of the season. It helps that Fox was 2-1 as QB1 with a win over ranked Houston.
But, Fox stared a 22-10 hole in the face heading into the fourth quarter, and it was on him to lead a team on a comeback, or decide to quit and roll over. Fox chose not to quit.
“He doesn’t have any quit in him,” Rodriguez said.
To start the fourth quarter, Fox led his team on a 10-play 72-yard touchdown drive to make it a 22-17 game with 10:41 to play.
WVU got a stop, and now Fox had a chance to take the lead with just a couple of minutes to play.
The drive didn’t start great, and WVU went backwards, facing a third-and-24. Fox dumped it off to running back Cyncir Bowers, who took off for 90 yards for the score. Just like that, WVU was up 23-22.
Fox didn’t do much there, but all day, he kept WVU in the game, and more importantly, gave the team hope of making a comeback, which it lacked through the first half of the season.
Fox broke his own true freshman passing yards record and threw for 353 yards and two touchdowns. He wasn’t so accurate, completing 19-of-31 passes.
The true freshman wasn’t perfect. Fox made some wrong reads and on the final drive of the game, couldn’t get his team into field goal range to win the game. It didn’t matter because if it was incomplete, the outcome would be the same, but Fox also threw a pick to close out the game.
“He did alright,” Rodriguez said. “He was seeing things, and there were other times where he had some true freshman moments.”
Fox didn’t lead his team to the win, but he showed he can lead a team on a comeback and keep the team fighting. After WVU beat Pitt in the Backyard Brawl, Rodriguez was emotional and said the West Virginia Mountaineers never quit, and his true freshman quarterback showed that against Arizona State, which is a good sign for the future.
“He’s a competitive guy,” Rodriguez said. “He loves to compete.”
