Instant Analysis: West Virginia-East Carolina

America has found the 2008 equivalent of the 2007 Kansas Jayhawks. It lives in Greenville, N.C.

After slaying Virginia Tech in week one, the East Carolina Pirates—with a younger member of the Holtz family walking confidently along the sidelines—made a far more resounding statement to the college football community in week two. The surprising aspect of ECU’s victory over No. 8 West Virginia was not the win itself, but the thoroughly authoritative way in which it was achieved. Doing the virtually unthinkable, the Pirates lived up to their nickname, stealing two turnovers from the Mountaineers and playing defense so nasty that Pat White, WVU’s all-world quarterback, was held to just 72 passing yards. From the opening kickoff to the final gun, East Carolina proved to be superior at every position on the field. No matter how you sliced it, this was a display of complete and comprehensive dominance by the Pirates, who never allowed West Virginia to breathe.

ECU quarterback Patrick Pinkney easily outplayed the much more ballyhooed White, completing 22 of 28 passes within the framework of a ball-control offense. By continuously moving the sticks and taking what the Mountaineers’ defense gave him, Pinkney kept the ball away from West Virginia and enabled his own defense to stay fresh.

And when that purple-shirted defense took the field, it destroyed WVU’s offensive front, winning almost every battle in the trenches. For all of the speed residing on the West Virginia roster, ECU made sure that its physicality would plug up running lanes and prevent the Mountaineers’ skilled studs from turning this contest into a track meet. The pattern of blue-collar Pirate power punishing the men from Morgantown repeated itself throughout the contest, and after 60 minutes of administering a plentiful portion of pain, the Pirates reveled in their newfound status as a genuine big dog in their sport, worthy of a top-ten ranking.

Only time will tell if East Carolina can stay the course, but if the Pirates are up to the task over the next ten games, Skip Holtz’s boys will be able to become this year’s Kansas… and crash the BCS bowl party from Conference USA.