West Virginia football must surpass outside expectations
There’s a lot of uncertainty when it comes to expectations for the West Virginia football team in 2025.
The Mountaineers have experienced plenty of turnover this off-season, with 75 new players being injected into the roster since head coach Rich Rodriguez took over.
There is no preseason media poll in the Big 12, but looking at various win total projections, West Virginia is slotted somewhere around five wins. That was the case with Circa Sports, which has the Mountaineers at the bottom of the Big 12 with just five wins.
West Virginia has a 12-game schedule this coming season, with the non-conference featuring Robert Morris, a road trip to Ohio, and finally the home matchup against Pittsburgh in the Backyard Brawl.
That isn’t necessarily smooth sailing but if the Mountaineers can get through those three games unblemished, it could potentially set up Rodriguez’s club to smash those projections.
The Big 12 is a league full of parity from top to bottom but the slate is one that could present challenges. When it comes to the teams on the schedule their projected win totals are at Kansas (7), Utah (7.5), at BYU (6.5), at UCF (5.5), TCU (6.5), at Houston (6.5), Colorado (6), at Arizona State (8.5) and Texas Tech (8.5) so the program is facing an uphill battle based on that alone.
Now, like most projections, those won’t hold any weight on the actual results but it does provide some perspective on where the program is expected to compete in the 2025 season.
Now, Rodriguez has made it clear that he isn’t treating his first year back in Morgantown as a rebuilding year and instead, the goal is to win immediately.
It wouldn’t be the first time that West Virginia has outpaced pre-season expectations but it’s clear that the Mountaineers are going to need to prove it again based on where the program is currently slotted.
__________________________________________
• Talk about it with West Virginia fans on The Blue Lot
• SUBSCRIBE today to stay up on the latest on Mountaineer sports and recruiting
• Get all of our WVU videos on YouTube by subscribing to the WVSports.com Channel
• Follow us on Twitter: @WVSportsDotCom, @rivalskeenan, @wesleyshoe
•Like us on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok
