It was a complete team effort last week for West Virginia against Arizona, as they were down several starters, including starting quarterback Garrett Greene and potential All-American left tackle Wyatt Milum.
Greene’s replacement, Nicco Marchiol stepped up in a big way completing,18-of-22 pass attempts for 198 yards and two scores. He made several impressive throws downfield, including each of his touchdown tosses. The first came on 4th & goal, where he threw open a doubled-down Hudson Clement in the back of the end zone to thread the needle. His second was a 55-yard bomb to Traylon Ray where he felt pressure from the front side, stepped up, and delivered a beauty.
“I thought he was really efficient on end-of-possession downs – third and fourth downs,” Neal Brown said of Marchiol’s performance. “That was a great throw he had downfield to Traylon Ray, that was huge. We really needed it and that proved to be kind of a deciding factor too. But I thought he was calm.”
“He’s so much a better player than he was last time he started a game. The last time he started a game versus Texas Tech, and that was a year ago. He’s mature, he’s been patient, and he’s gotten better, and I’ve said that a lot… and then he showed that today. He didn’t play very well in the second half of the Kansas State game which was a tough setting for him. But I thought he really stepped today when we needed him and I thought he played really well.”
With his performance, Marchiol was named to Pro Football Focus’ Week 9 Big 12 Team of the Week. West Virginia linebacker Josiah Trotter and cornerback Dontez Fagan were also featured on the team. Trotter finished the game with four tackles while Fagan registered six stops to go along with one pass defended.
