Rich Rodriguez and Scott Frost new to Big 12 in
Rich Rodriguez and Scott Frost are new to the Big 12 Conference, however not to the schools that have actually welcomed them back.Rodriguez at West Virginia and Frost at UCF are the just brand-new coaches in the 16-team Huge 12, and now have actually been through their very first spring given that returning to their old schools.West Virginia has gone through 13 seasons in the Big 12
, but were still in the Big East when Rodriguez led the Mountaineers to 3 consecutive 11-win seasons from 2005-07 before his departure for Michigan.Frost was the coach for UCF’s unbeaten season out of the American Athletic Conference in 2017, when the Knights stated themselves nationwide champs before he left for Nebraska.Things did feel various for Frost than his very first spring with the Knights in 2016, when they were coming off an 0-12 season.
“Our very first skirmish out here in the spring, I was discouraged coming off that field. … We didn’t do anything great, or a minimum of it felt that way
,”Frost stated, remembering 2016 before turning to this spring.”We’re doing some good things. There’s just a level of speed and precision to execution that needs to occur on every single play to make it work, and we’re not there yet. “The Knights were 10-15 in their first two Big 12 seasons under Gus Malzahn, the previous nationwide champion who left UCF after four seasons to end up being offending
organizer at Florida State. The back-to-back losing records to open their Huge 12 era followed a school-record 6 gaining seasons in a row, which started with the 13-0 season after Frost’s 6-7 debut.The second stint for Rodriguez at West Virginia comes 18 years after his very first one ended. He will need to make wholesale modifications in the name, image and similarity era– together with the transfer portal and pending lineup limits– if the Mountaineers are going to contend for a Big 12 title.The offense lost its whole line and leading 3 receivers. 4 receivers return who combined for 524 lawns last season.”We just don’t have enough for our system … We simply don’t have sufficient bodies,”Rodriguez stated.”We want someone clearly who can be that 1-on-1 guy
that you can rely on. And our guys are improving, getting some confidence in them. But we literally don’t have enough bodies to run the way we
want to run it.”Big 12 backs in the NFL draft All five Big 12 running backs who balanced at least 100 lawns per game last season were chosen in last week’s NFL draft.Only two of the top 10 rushes from last season are still in the league: Baylor’s Bryson Washington(1,028 backyards, 12 goals)and BYU’s LJ Martin(723 yards, 7 TDs). West Virginia’s offense might revolve around
running back Jahiem White, who had 845 lawns hurrying and averaged 6.5 yards per bring last season in a two-back system for the Mountaineers.Dylan Edwards, now a junior at Kansas State,
balanced 7.4 yards on his 74 brings in 2015 behind drafted JD Giddens. Carson Hansen had 13 rushing TDs for Iowa State, the most for any Huge 12 returning back.All-everything running back Camera Skattebo is gone from reigning Big 12 champion Arizona State, which just included Kanye Udoh from the transfer website after he ran for 1,117 yards and 10 TDs last season for Army.Some signal callers There are a great deal of knowledgeable quarterbacks in the Big 12,
but it was a troubled spring at that position for Oklahoma State.Maealiuaki Smith and Garrett Rangel, the only Oklahoma State quarterbacks with significant experience, entered the transfer portal. That left the Cowboys with Zane Flores and Hauss Hejny. Flores played just sparingly last season. Hejny, a redshirt freshman, is a transfer from TCU.Colorado has to replace quarterback Shedeur Sanders, and has a two-QB race in between Liberty transfer Kaidon Salter and Julian Lewis, the extremely touted luxury hire who enrolled early to go through spring drills. The Buffaloes prepare to find a little bit more balance in between the run and the pass more this season, which is why coach Deion
Sanders hired Hall of Famer Marshall Faulk as the running backs coach.Among the Big 12 returners is Sam Leavitt, who passed for 2,885 lawn and 24 TDs to assist Arizona State win the Big 12 after transferring from Michigan State. Sawyer Robertson is back at Baylor after his 3,071 yards and 28 TDs, one more passing score than
TCU’s Josh Hoover (3,949 lawns)and Texas Tech’s Behren Morton(3,335 backyards). Various directions in Utah BYU, coming off a 5-7 launching in the Huge 12 in 2023, was probably the biggest surprise team in the league last season, increasing as high as No. 6 in the CFP rankings in November before completing 11-2 with an Alamo Bowl success over Colorado. BYU has tons of returning experience on both sides of the ball. However the Cougars likewise deal with concerns along the defensive line where they finished every starter from last season.Utah collapsed in its Big 12 debut in 2015, going from preseason title favorites to a seven-game losing streak. The Utes brought in previous New Mexico offensive planner Jason Beck to overhaul an offense that ranked near the bottom of the Huge 12 in practically every significant statistical classification last season.