West Virginia Head Coach Neal Brown recently appeared on the Heartland College Sports podcast, hosted by Pete Mundo. On the podcast, Brown talked about various topics, such as the new Big 12, Garrett Greene, and the ever-changing landscape of college athletics with NIL implementation.
“I think we’re definitely the most exciting (conference)”, Brown stated when asked about the Big 12 this upcoming season. “I think if you look from a depth standpoint and a competitive balance standpoint the Big 12 is number one.”
Brown sees the upcoming season as one that will be very competitive, saying that all 16 schools in the Big 12 conference have quality teams. “The hard thing about this league is everybody that you play has an opportunity to beat you. The encouraging thing, or the exciting thing about this league is that you got a chance to win every single game.” While Brown makes that claim by representing just one school in the Big 12, he feels that every other head coach would feel the same way.
When asked about senior quarterback Garrett Greene, Brown thinks he’s as dynamic as anybody in college football. “He can really run, he’s a fast kid, he breaks tackles; true dual threat.”
Brown didn’t avoid any criticism towards his quarterback, acknowledging his accuracy as what needs to be his biggest area of improvement. “He’s got to improve his completion percentage. He finished the year at 53%. Now, part of that is we threw the ball downfield a lot… but, he’s got to get more effective in the red zone and on third down from a completion percentage standpoint, and if he can do that… I think he can make upwards eight to twelve percentage points, to go from 53(%) to anywhere from 61 to 65%.” Brown seems to have faith in Greene’s improvement for the upcoming season. He believes that if he improves his accuracy while maintaining his running and downfield passing skills, Greene can prove that he’s one of the top players in college football.
Finally, Brown admitted that West Virginia was slow to react when asked about the changing college landscape due to NIL rules changing in 2021. “We were a little late to the new world of college football… you could see it coming. I’m not surprised at where we’re at in college athletics and college football right now, but we were slow to react and it hurt us a lot in the ‘22 season.”
