Devine will play against Bearcats

By Dave Morrison

MORGANTOWN — The good news is, it looks like West Virginia running back Noel Devine is a go for the Mountaineers (7-2, 3-1 Big East) when they visit No. 5 Cincinnati (9-0, 5-0) Friday night.

The game will be broadcast live on ESPN2 at 8 p.m.

The bad news?

Devine hasn’t had his best days against the Bearcats’ defense and he is coming off an ankle injury late in the first half of the Louisville game last Saturday. At the time of his injury, Devine had 13 carries for 56 yards.

Last year in Morgantown, Devine had 58 yards on 19 carries. He also caught six passes for 48 yards.

In 2007, he had two carries for 23 yards.

Of course, it’s just not Devine.

The offense as a whole hasn’t clicked on all cylinders.

And that starts with QB Jarrett Brown. And the senior also sustained an ankle injury last Saturday but should be good to go against the Bearcats.

“He is moving around well and looks to me like he has his feet back under him,” coach Bill Stewart said. “His foot was sprained, but I told him that I wanted him to be alive in the pocket and have fun. I want him to play like it is sandlot football. He needs to pick it up, and he knows it. We all need to pick it up. Coach better, play better, it all needs to be better.”

How vital are the two?

Brown is 140-of-216 passing for 1,661 yards and 10 touchdowns.

Devine has rushed for 1,010 yards and 10 scores.

Slotback Jock Sanders replaced Devine in the Louisville game and rushed for 66 yards.

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Julian Miller has developed into one of the best defensive linemen in the Big East, which isn’t a total surprise, given his finish in 2008 when he had 3.5 sacks in the second half of the season.

“I don’t want people to think I got better just over the past couple games,” Miller said. “I’d say this entire year has been a breakthrough for me. I want to continue this through the last couple games and into a bowl game. By the end of this year I want to be able to say that I did a lot more than what I expected to do.”

He was huge against Louisville when he sacked Cardinal quarterback Will Stein on consecutive plays to thwart a late Louisville dive in WVU’s 17-9 win.

“It may take you up to 20 pass rushes until you can actually get the quarterback just one time,” Miller said. “One of the things that was going through my head in crunch time was that I was going to have to step in as a leader because a lot of our big players on the defensive line were out. It ended up working out.”

Miller has 38 tackles, 8.5 sacks, 11.5 tackles for a loss, and was credited with the safety against South Florida.

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Speaking of the decimated defensive line, Miller was the only starter to finish the game, as Chris Neild (shoulder) and Scooter Berry were all out a good portion of the game. Starter Josh Taylor missed the entire game after six straight starts.

Neild said he could have returned.

“Larry Ford wasn’t doing a bad job in there,” Neild said. “I was only going to go in if the rushing game really started to come into form, but we held them and he did a good job.”

He said he expects to play Friday night.

“My shoulder is better. It was hurting a little last week when the game started, and then I banged it up a little bit during the game.”

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Cincinnati beat WVU 26-23 in overtime last year after WVU stormed back by scoring 13 unanswered points in the fourth quarter, including a 52-yard Pat McAfee field goal.

After McAfee gave WVU the lead in overtime with a 27-yard field goal, Kazeem Ali caught a 2-yard pass from QB Tony Pike to give the Bearcats the win.

Cincinnati in fifth nationally in scoring offense (40 points per game) and No. 3 overall (averaging 482.6 yards per game). WVU is 51st (28.3) and 52nd (393.6) in those categories.

West Virginia leads the all-time series 14-2-1.

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