MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — A year ago, in his fourth season playing college football and second at West Virginia, quarterback Jarret Doege competed in his first bowl game against Army.
While West Virginia rallied for a 24-21 victory over the Black Knights for its first postseason win since January 2016, Doege struggled in the opening half and was benched in favor of Austin Kendall for the final two quarters.
As Doege prepares for his second postseason affair December 28 against Minnesota in the Guaranteed Rate Bowl, the veteran says he’s not thinking back to last year’s struggles against Army.
“I put that one behind me a long time ago,” Doege said. “I’m going into this game preparing like I usually prepare and going there with a great mindset to win the football game.”
Before Kendall took a snap in the Liberty Bowl, the Mountaineers’ deficit grew from four points to 21-10, but the signal-caller who transferred to Louisiana Tech last offseason led two scoring drives and threw a pair of touchdowns to help WVU prevail.
Doege, meanwhile, threw a first-half touchdown pass against the Black Knights, but was intercepted once, lost a fumble that directly led to Army’s first TD and passed for 159 yards on 25 attempts. West Virginia’s starting quarterback had difficulty shaking off rust in what was only the Mountaineers’ second game from November 15 through December 31.
“We’ve changed up our prep a little bit,” WVU head coach Neal Brown said. “Last year, he did not play very well and he would take full ownership of that, but our season was so odd at the end. We played one game over a six-week period. The pass game is such a rhythm deal and we had the shutdown with covid, too, so we were out of the facility for ten days.
“What we’ve tried to do this year, while we were out on the road [recruiting] as coaches, they had four different throwing sessions to keep in rhythm. I think that’ll be helpful. But he has to go out and perform. Last year was odd. I’m not making an excuse for him. He didn’t play very well. We didn’t play very well at all offensively. We had a bunch of dropped balls, too. But we’ve done a better job this year of staying in rhythm and we’re not having to deal with some of the issues we had last year.”
While Doege says he’s put the subpar showing against Army behind him, it could perhaps serve as extra incentive for the redshirt senior to put forth a better performance against the Golden Gophers.
“I just prepare harder. Kind of like 2019, I threw three interceptions versus TCU, and then in 2020, I wiped that and we beat them, and I had a pretty good game,” Doege said. “Just try to make it a different outcome and prepare harder. Go into the game not thinking about last year’s game, but thinking about what my job is and what I need to do to win a football game.”
Next Tuesday’s contest with the Golden Gophers will mark Doege’s 27th start at West Virginia. His up-and-down 2021 season has featured 2,908 passing yards with 19 touchdowns and 11 interceptions to this point. He’s completed better than 65 percent of his passes and is the Big 12 Conference’s second-leading passer by yardage, but also ranks second in interceptions.
The matchup against a stingy Minnesota defense could be Doege’s last game as a Mountaineer, or the Lubbock, Texas native could opt to return to Morgantown and exercise a free year of eligibility as a result of the pandemic.
If Doege chooses to come back to college, next season would mark his sixth in college — two at Bowling Green and four at West Virginia.
“I haven’t really got to the decision yet,” Doege said. “I’m just going to focus on the bowl game, see what happens after and talk to coach Brown. I didn’t really want to make this whole thing about me. I want to make it about winning the bowl game.”