CLICK HERE to view slide show of WVU-Pitt photos  

PITTSBURGH - The plot lines were different and so was the game itself. Suffice it to say, though, that ultimately this Backyard Brawl ended eerily similar to the last one for West Virginia.

It ended with Pat White throwing an impossible pass toward Wes Lyons in the end zone, trying to salvage a game that it was hard to understand how the Mountaineers could have lost to Pittsburgh.

No, this wasn't a case of being dominated by the Panthers with so much on the line, as was the case a year ago in Morgantown. But just as mystifying, this time the Mountaineers had taken control of the game only to let it slip away.

In the end, though, perhaps the difference between the teams was pretty much the same from one year to the next. Pitt tailback LeSean McCoy, who a year ago ran 38 times and nearly outgained the Mountaineers himself with 148 yards, this time carried 33 times for 183 yards and scored twice in the fourth quarter as the Panthers won 19-15 at Heinz Field.

The loss eliminated West Virginia (7-4, 4-2 Big East) from any chance of winning the league's automatic BCS bowl berth, which now goes to Cincinnati regardless of the outcome of the Bearcats' game with Syracuse today. The only potential consolation is that a Syracuse win today would keep WVU and Pitt (8-3, 4-2) - along with Rutgers - in contention to share the conference title.

"We had the game in our hands and just let it get away from us,'' West Virginia's Jock Sanders said.

Indeed, the Mountaineers did.

After withstanding yet another slow start and even more short-yardage problems, West Virginia took a 15-7 lead into the fourth quarter, but two huge mistakes spelled the difference. First, an interception set up one Panthers score, giving Pitt the ball at the WVU 16-yard line. And then on the next series, with the Mountaineers trying to run some clock, a third-down holding penalty on All-America tackle Ryan Stanchek forced a punt that gave Pitt the chance to drive for the winning score.

McCoy capped both drives with short runs, the last from a yard out with under a minute to play. He carried nine times on the 10-play, 59-yard winning drive.

"He made the right plays at the right time,'' WVU cornerback Ellis Lankster said of McCoy, a redshirt sophomore who broke his personal high for rushing yards in a game. "He's hard to take because he's aggressive and he's quick. That's a tough combination.''

 CLICK HERE to view slide show of WVU-Pitt photos  

PITTSBURGH - The plot lines were different and so was the game itself. Suffice it to say, though, that ultimately this Backyard Brawl ended eerily similar to the last one for West Virginia.

It ended with Pat White throwing an impossible pass toward Wes Lyons in the end zone, trying to salvage a game that it was hard to understand how the Mountaineers could have lost to Pittsburgh.

No, this wasn't a case of being dominated by the Panthers with so much on the line, as was the case a year ago in Morgantown. But just as mystifying, this time the Mountaineers had taken control of the game only to let it slip away.

In the end, though, perhaps the difference between the teams was pretty much the same from one year to the next. Pitt tailback LeSean McCoy, who a year ago ran 38 times and nearly outgained the Mountaineers himself with 148 yards, this time carried 33 times for 183 yards and scored twice in the fourth quarter as the Panthers won 19-15 at Heinz Field.

The loss eliminated West Virginia (7-4, 4-2 Big East) from any chance of winning the league's automatic BCS bowl berth, which now goes to Cincinnati regardless of the outcome of the Bearcats' game with Syracuse today. The only potential consolation is that a Syracuse win today would keep WVU and Pitt (8-3, 4-2) - along with Rutgers - in contention to share the conference title.

"We had the game in our hands and just let it get away from us,'' West Virginia's Jock Sanders said.

Indeed, the Mountaineers did.

After withstanding yet another slow start and even more short-yardage problems, West Virginia took a 15-7 lead into the fourth quarter, but two huge mistakes spelled the difference. First, an interception set up one Panthers score, giving Pitt the ball at the WVU 16-yard line. And then on the next series, with the Mountaineers trying to run some clock, a third-down holding penalty on All-America tackle Ryan Stanchek forced a punt that gave Pitt the chance to drive for the winning score.

McCoy capped both drives with short runs, the last from a yard out with under a minute to play. He carried nine times on the 10-play, 59-yard winning drive.

"He made the right plays at the right time,'' WVU cornerback Ellis Lankster said of McCoy, a redshirt sophomore who broke his personal high for rushing yards in a game. "He's hard to take because he's aggressive and he's quick. That's a tough combination.''

West Virginia wasn't quite done after McCoy's last touchdown. White immediately completed passes of 24 yards to Bradley Starks and 13 to Alric Arnett to put WVU at the Pitt 27 with 27 seconds to play. But two throws toward Starks were incomplete, then on a third-down pass Lyons gained 8 yards but failed to get out of bounds. The Mountaineers managed to get back to the line and snap the ball, but White's pass toward Lyons in the end zone was uncatchable. Even if it had been near the receiver, Lyons was whistled for offensive pass interference on the play.

A year ago, at the end of Pitt's 13-9 win at Mountaineer Field, White was also throwing to Lyons in the end zone on the final offensive play.

"We were just not mentally sharp,'' West Virginia coach Bill Stewart said. "We didn't get out of bounds, we had penalties, we had a lot of things like that.''

Trailing 7-3 after a first half in which they were fortunate not to be down by much more, the Mountaineers began chipping back with a long field-goal drive to start the third quarter. Pat McAfee's 26-yarder made it 7-6.

Then came the kind of play from White that has defined his career. Going left on a third-and-4 play, he reversed field, danced around blocks from Sanders, Lyons and Noel Devine and turned it into a 54-yard touchdown run. The extra-point attempt failed when backup holder Carmen Connelly - playing his second game in place of suspended Jeremy Kash - couldn't get the ball down for McAfee's kick and wound up scrambling around before being tackled. That left the Mountaineers with a 12-7 lead. McAfee added 40-yard field goal after a Brandon Hogan interception to make it 15-7.

To that point, West Virginia was following its recent scripts, overcoming a poor first half and dominating the second. Pitt had done next to nothing on its first four possessions of the second half and it seemed only a matter of time before the Mountaineers would pull away.

Then came Jovani Chappel's interception of White's pass that turned everything.

In the first half, Pitt dominated as much as any team can dominate and still, amazingly, held just a 7-3 lead. The Panthers marched 64 yards in five easy plays after the opening kickoff to lead 7-0 on a 30-yard pass from Bill Stull to Derek Kinder, then had first-and-goal at the WVU 9- and 3-yard lines before halftime. But first they self-destructed with penalties before Connor Lee uncharacteristically missed a 40-yard field goal and, just before halftime, Stull tried a fade pass into the end zone on second down from the 2-yard line that Quinton Andrews intercepted.

West Virginia, meanwhile, did next to nothing, generating just 100 yards of offense and four first downs. The only thing that saved the Mountaineers was when John Holmes stripped Stull in the pocket and Scooter Berry recovered at the Pitt 39. Sanders got West Virginia to second-and-goal at the 1 in just two plays, including a 29-yard run. Then, of course, WVU's short-yardage nightmares were revisited when White lost 2 yards on second down and failed to connect with Lyons on a lob pass into the end zone on third down. The Mountaineers settled for a 20-yard McAfee field goal, and that 7-3 score held up throughout the half.

Reach Dave Hickman at 348-1734 or dphickm...@aol.com.