NC State vs. #14 West Virginia Likely Won’t Be Rescheduled

As reported earlier, the NC State vs. #14 West Virginia football game will not be played this Saturday.

Even though the game was cancelled for this Saturday, the official release didn’t guarantee that it was cancelled entirely. Rescheduling the game still seemed to be on the table as a possibility, even if it was a small one.

West Virginia’s Athletic Director Shane Lyons held a press conference yesterday explaining why the likelihood of making this game happen in 2018 is very unlikely.

“I will not be scheduling a game during our bye week,” he explained. “Anybody who understands football knows I’m not going to play a game on Saturday and then turn around and play a game on Thursday night. That’s not an option for me, especially when our opponent has a week-and-a-half to prepare.”

“As for Dec. 1, I plan on being in Dallas (for the Big 12 Championship game),” he said.  (Link)

Bye Week Breakdown

• NC State’s bye week is October 13th, and West Virginia’s is October 20th.
• West Virginia has Iowa St. on the schedule for October 13th.
• NC State has Clemson on the schedule for October 20th.

Lyons is unwilling to schedule a game on October 20th because the Mountaineers have a big matchup against Baylor the following Thursday. NC State plays Clemson on the 20th anyway.

WOWK reported yesterday that a source said that one possibility could be for West Virginia to move their football game with Iowa State to October 18th, still giving them a week before Baylor. This would free up the two teams to play on NC State’s scheduled bye week. Giving up their bye week is no small thing for the Wolfpack, because it is the week before their matchup against Clemson. Also, for this to happen, Iowa St. would have to be willing to be flexible as well. To throw another wrench into that possibility, the North Carolina State Fair is in town that week, making this next to impossible.

December 1st is a possibility, but both teams obviously are dreaming they won’t be available, because they will be playing for a conference championship that weekend. If it becomes clear that neither team will be playing for a conference championship, it will be interesting to see if the schools make this happen on this weekend.

At the end of the day, it is nearly impossible to see a scenario where this game gets played in 2018, but NC State is still scheduled to go to West Virginia next year.