Neal Brown 'upset' West Virginia picked last in Big 12 media poll

West Virginia has been hanging around .500 for the extent of Neal Brown’s four seasons in Morgantown. However, some in the media see them taking a nose dive as they picked WVU to finish in last in the Big 12 this season.

That made Brown a very unhappy man upon his appearance at Big 12 Media Days in Arlington. He started off hot with his disagreement when up at the podium. However, he said that, for one, he isn’t too pressed about it considering the voting is often incorrect by the end and, for two, it’s going to be used as a motiving factor for him and his team to get “into football mode.”

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

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

From there, Brown went on about all the reasons that the slight would be false come the end of the season. He listed off things such as belief within their locker room as well as how West Virginia closed last season. With that said, their returning experience is really why Neal thinks the last place prediction is off-base.

“This is why I disagree. First of all, it starts with belief in our staff and belief in our players,” said Brown. “And then how we finished will be the next thing. We beat Oklahoma, beat Oklahoma State on the road, winning two of our last three games.

“Offensively? This is going to be our best group. And then we have 132 starts returning on the offensive line. 132. If that’s not the most in the country, it’s got to be close,” Brown continued. “Within that group we’ve got four former freshman All-Americans. We’ve got three for sure all-conference type players. Two of them are here with us today. Zach Frazier, who’s a two-time All-American. And then Doug Nester. We have a budding superstar at running back in CJ Donaldson. And, defensively, we’re going to be one of the most improved units in the Big 12, if not in the country.

“We have all-league type players at each level and those guys are here today. Sean Martin at defensive end. Lee Kpogba who will be one of the leading tacklers in the conference this year at Mike linebacker,. And then Aubrey Burks at safety. All three guys here talented experience and secondary through the transfer portal,” said Brown. “And then returning on special teams we’ve got our punter and our long snapper who are both two of the better ones in our league.

Brown is 22-25 since taking over the Mountaineer’s program in 2019. In that stretch, their best finish by record was at 6-4 in 2020 and their best finish in the Big 12 was sixth-place in both ’20 and ’21.

Last year was one of the worst ones yet, though, as they tied the overall (5-7) and Big 12 (3-6) records from when he took over in 2019 while also finishing second to last in the conference at ninth.

With that said, there’s no wonder why Brown wouldn’t see this as disregard, especially considering the Big 12 is adding four brand new programs this fall. That’s why he and his team are now as excited to kick things off and prove the conference and the media that covers it wrong.

“(We’re) looking forward to proving everybody wrong on that front. We won’t finish there,” Brown proclaimed.