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WACO, Texas -- For three quarters it looked as if West Virginia would make quick work of Matt Rhule's Baylor Bears.
Then came the final 15 minutes.
"Yeah, it's hard to explain," Rhule said. "For three quarters they (WVU) looked like they could beat anybody in the Big 12 and then during that fourth quarter we looked like we could."
Last season, WVU jumped out to a 25-point third quarter lead and then held off a furious Baylor comeback to defeat the Bears, 38-36, in McLane Stadium.
"It's hard to figure," Rhule said. "We were playing with a backup quarterback and a reserve running back and nearly pulled that one out. So, yes, we talked about (the comeback) and we talked about the importance of not getting that far behind again."
No. 13 West Virginia (5-1, 3-1 Big 12) will look to bounce back against a Baylor team (4-3, 2-2) at 7 p.m. tonight at Milan Puskar Stadium.
"Offensively, their quarterback is playing well," WVU coach Dana Holgorsen said. "We saw (Charlie) Brewer up close and personal last year. He's a good football player, came from a great high school in Texas, was coached the right way, played a lot of ball and is a good football player.
"We're seeing a lot of these younger-type quarterbacks, which I've seen that in the Big 12 forever and ever. When you lose some good ones, that doesn't mean that there aren't any good ones left. That just means there's nobody that knows who they are yet. He's one of those guys that's a Texas high school guy that has played a lot of ball and is a gritty, smart, tough, hard-nosed football player. They do a lot of different things with him. They'll run him, he'll get out of the pocket and scramble, they'll do some quarterback-run game. He's a really good football player."
How good?
Well, in basically one quarter of action a year ago, the Bears quarterback completed 8 of 13 attempts for 109 yards and two touchdowns while rushing 10 times for 61 yards.
So far in 2018 the Texas native has made good on 132 of his 206 attempts for 1,558 yards and nine touchdowns with only two interceptions.
But, when Brewer isn't driving defenses crazy with his scrambles, the Bears will look to break down defenses with a stable of running backs.
"They have a bunch of different backs that they'll go to," Holgorsen said. "They are going to keep rotating them in there, much like we do.
"The two receivers, really three of them, are really impressive to me. But the (Denzel) Mims kid is a difference-maker. We saw him last year take one on us, and we've seen him the last couple of years. All the talk about the (Jalen) Hurd kid from Tennessee is legit. He has turned into a legit receiver, you never know how that transition is going to work. It looks like he's leaned up a lot. He's a tall, lean kid that plays hard. He likes to play, he plays with effort, but he's adjusting to receiver life pretty well to me.
"Those guys are going to be a handful for us."
JaMycal Hasty leads the way with 285 yards and three touchdowns on 48 carries while John Lovett adds 239 and a trio of scores on 44 carries. Then there is Trestan Ebner, who rushed for 54 yards and one touchdown on three rushes against the Mountaineers a year ago.
The Bears top receiver is Hurd (40-550, 3 TDs) while Mims (32-449, 3 TDs) and Hasty (18-133, TD) are the top pass catchers.