“A nine-win season proves that we were a better team than that,” the team said. WVU surpassed predictions and took pleasure in proving doubters incorrect.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Nearly six months have passed since West Virginia was selected to finish last in the 14-team Big 12 Conference 

On that July day from AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, Mountaineers’ head coach Neal Brown made no bones about voicing his displeasure with where his team had been selected.

“I’ll start with this, because I’m sure I’m going to get asked about it. Upset about the media poll,” Brown said. “Definitely do not agree with that. The positive is that the media has not been, as far as predicting the Big 12, successful in recent years. So that bodes well for us.

“But on a more serious note. I was sitting on the beach last week, whenever Mike Montoro, the best in the business and our sports information director for football, sent me a text. And I made the mistake of looking at it. From that point on, my vacation was over. I went into football mode.”

West Virginia’s coaches and players alike used the number 14 as a motivational tool from that day forward. A season-opening loss at Penn State did little to deter the WVU locker room from feeling as though the Mountaineers were plenty capable of proving the naysayers wrong and putting together a successful season

WVU went on to do just that, winning each of its remaining two non-conference games and then rattling off six victories in Big 12 play to finish the regular season 8-4 and in a three-way tie for fourth in the league.

The Mountaineers wrapped up their most successful season yet in Brown’s five years as head coach Wednesday when West Virginia went out winners by knocking off North Carolina, 30-10, in the Duke’s Mayo Bowl at Bank of America Stadium.

In less than half a calendar year, Brown went from seeing his team projected last in the league to ending a season with nine victories, eight of which came against Power 5 Conference competition, and being doused with mayonnaise moments after he improved to 2-1 in bowl games at WVU.

“Being picked 14th in our league was not very good reporting,” Brown said following the win over UNC. “We returned the most starts of anybody in our league on our offensive line and we had really good running backs coming back and we had some pieces defensively up front.

“Never did I think that’s where we were and at our media days in Dallas, I said, that’s not what we were going to be. I liked our team. We have a good mix of youth that’s really hungry and some leaders with experience that havesomething about them. Anytime your d-line and o-line are your two best groups, you have a chance to win.

There’s no question West Virginia got scheduling breaks within the Big 12 as the four teams the Mountaineers didn’t face in the league — Texas, Kansas State, Kansas and Iowa State — finished the regular season a combined 25-11 in Big 12 play and 36-14 overall. It’s also important to remember that the impending departure of both Texas and Oklahoma to the Southeastern Conference is why the Big 12 added newcomers Cincinnati, Central Florida, BYU and Houston and had to tweak its scheduling format to where every team in the conference didn’t play each other.

The Mountaineers did have each of the league’s four new additions on their 2023 schedule and combined to finish 3-1 against them.

The satisfaction from WVU players was noticeable in the aftermath of a win over the Tar Heels that enabled the Mountaineers to finish with at least nine victories for only the second time since joining the Big 12 before the 2012 season.

“That’s been my Lock Screen ever since those polls came out, just because I knew what we had in this locker room,” said quarterback Garrett Greene, a pivotal piece of the team’s success and the Duke’s Mayo Bowl MVP. “With guys like these two here [linebacker Lee Kpogba and cornerback Beanie Bishop Jr.], our offensive line, running backs and wideouts, I knew what we had in that locker room. Pardon my French here, but it kind of pissed everybody off. We knew we were a better team than that and a nine-win season shows that.”

Greene has committed to returning to West Virginia in 2024 for his fifth and final season of college football. So, too, has true freshman tailback Jahiem White, who finished the 2023 campaign as his team’s leading rusher despite having the third most attempts.

The Mountaineers will discover far more regarding who will and won’t return in the near future with the NCAA Transfer Portal open through January 2. 

With the Sooners and Longhorns leaving for the SEC, the Big 12 has added Colorado, Utah, Arizona and Arizona State, making it a 16-team conference in the near future.

Brown doesn’t expect his team to be chosen to finish last or in 14th come summer.

“This is a significant step for us. We have to continue to hold our roster together. The next eight to ten days are big,” Brown said. “There’s no more taking off and going to the beach to relax for some time. That doesn’t exist anymore. We have to hold on to our roster, but it speaks well to what we can be and potentially could be in 2024.