South Florida stops No. 20 West Virginia again

TAMPA, Fla. — To stop a two-game losing streak, South Florida coach Jim Leavitt implored his players to do one thing against West Virginia.

“The motto for the week was ‘Do What Got You Here,” to USF, quarterback B.J. Daniels said Friday night after the Bulls rebounded to upset the 20th-ranked Mountaineers 30-19 at Raymond James Stadium.

The dual-threat redshirt freshman took the message to heart, throwing for 232 yards and running for 104 yards more to help USF (6-2, 2-2) beat its Big East rival for the third time in four years.

With 336 yards of total offense, Daniels accounted for more yards than the entire West Virginia team.

Daniels improved to 3-2 since replacing Matt Grothe, who had a season-ending knee injury in the third week of the season.

He kept West Virginia (6-2, 2-1) off balance with his mobility and made some of his biggest throws while scrambling to buy time.

“They were expecting me to run once I got outside the pocket, so a lot of the DBs had their eyes on me, and our guys got behind them,” said Daniels, who threw TD passes of 49 yards to Carlton Mitchell, 11 yards to A.J. Love and 6 yards to Sterling Griffin.

Meanwhile, the Bulls bounced back from two subpar defensive performances to frustrate Noel Devine and the rest of West Virginia’s offense, which sputtered after going 80 yards following the opening kickoff to lead 7-0.

USF allowed 75 points and 887 yards in Big East losses to Cincinnati and Pittsburgh the previous two weeks, yet found a way to hold the speedy Devine to his lowest rushing total of the season.

Devine, who grew up 2 hours south of Tampa, has five 100-yard games this season. He was limited to 42 yards on 17 carries after not being held to fewer than 80 in West Virginia’s first seven games.

USF hopes ending its losing streak against an opponent the caliber of the Mountaineers will eliminate questions about whether they can avoid another midseason swoon. In 2007 and 2008, the Bulls finished poorly after fast starts carried them into the Top 25.

“I guess a lot of people doubted us and thought we were going to go down the same patch we did the last two years,” Daniels said. “That was a lot of garbage that our team didn’t listen to.”

Jarrett Brown scored on runs of 3 and 11 yards for West Virginia, however the senior quarterback had sporadic success throwing (19 of 32 for 205 yards, one interception) against a defense geared to stop the run.

Devine entered the game averaging 130.3 yards — third in the nation — and 89 shy of topping 1,000 for the second straight season.

“We talked a lot about him,” Leavitt said. “We didn’t want to let him get outside — we wanted to keep him hemmed up inside. … He’s such a great back. If he gets out, he’s gone.”

West Virginia was trying to remain unbeaten in the conference, along with Cincinnati and Pittsburgh. The Mountaineers lost to South Florida in 2006 and 2007 and have dropped three of five games overall in the budding rivalry.

“There’s some young hurting guys in there, both physically and mentally. And they should be,” West Virginia coach Bill Stewart said. “That was a hard-fought game. I cannot fault our effort.”