CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- LET'S dig into the "woulda, coulda" file for a piece of delicious irony:

There's a chance that Hanna could turn No. 8 West Virginia at East Carolina into a plodding Pirate puddle -- and I thought Miami took the Hurricanes to the ACC -- but however it blows, Saturday's football game could have looked very different on the sidelines ...

When Rich Rodriguez bolted for Michigan in mid-December, WVU went on a coaching search. Some of it was well chronicled, some not. Don Holliday and Butch Jones appeared to be the most prominent of those seriously interviewed.

Bill Stewart was named the Mountaineer interim coach and few considered the state native of many sideline stops likely to emerge with the job, much less with what is regarded as the biggest victory in WVU history.

Before Stewart took WVU into the Fiesta Bowl against Oklahoma WVU Athletic Director Ed Pastilong -- using proper college athletics protocol that some these days ignore -- contacted Terry Holland and told the ECU athletic director that the Mountaineers "will be in touch after the bowl game," or something to that effect.

Holland has confirmed that, and it's been reported here before. No question that one of WVU's potential targets was Pirates Coach Skip Holtz ... and why not?

Holtz is a "name," is 44, has oodles of connections starting with his famous father (Follansbee native Lou) and including Steve Spurrier and Bobby Bowden, has won at Connecticut and ECU and is a rising star in his profession.

Then, the Mountaineers won the game and Stewart was the chosen one. It never got that far with Holtz. WVU was known to have a preference for someone who had been a head coach, and No one in Morgantown will deny Holtz was a large potential target.

Holland congratulated WVU on its selection, and was no doubt happy he didn't lose a quality coach and faced another search.

Holliday, with no head coaching experience, was a favorite son, but likely a backup plan for WVU. He's on Stewart's staff with the highest salary for an assistant in WVU history ($400,000) because of his great recruiting savvy - which already is obvious in the Mountaineer 2009 commitment list.

Jones is doing a very impressive job at Central Michigan. How many Mid-American Conference programs (or any below the BCS automatic conference level for that matter) have landed 22 commitments for the next recruiting season this early?

However, Jones had his WVU naysayers because of his past work on the staff of the suddenly reviled Rodriguez (and Jones had no other connections to the Mountain State).

If WVU hadn't won the Fiesta Bowl -- and especially if the Mountaineers had played poorly against the Sooners (and they did anything but) -- Stewart wasn't going to get that job.

Holtz, on a five-year ECU deal for $4.35 million plus incentives (sweetened again recently through 2013) was better than just a good possibility in Morgantown ... unless he would have turned down the job. And why would he have done that?

So, it's no stretch to say that a stunning Bowl Championship Series win by WVU kept Holtz in Conference USA, and on the opposite sideline from where he might have been this Saturday at Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium.

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THE BIG East has started the 2008 season mighty tiny.

In Week 1, there were four losses to major college foes, including two home games to teams below the BCS automatic leagues (Bowling Green over Pitt and Fresno State over Rutgers), and four so-what wins over Division I-AA teams.

OK, so maybe it still is a basketball conference?

Syracuse and Louisville showed up putrid in losses to Northwestern and Kentucky, respectively -- and the two Wildcats hardly are expected to challenge for the upper halves of their conferences.

Want some perspective on the meltdown for openers? Well, you have to go back six years to find one football weekend when the Big East dropped at least four games to non-conference teams.

On Sept. 5-7, 2002, the Big East was 2-5. It was Oregon State over Temple, Texas A&M over Pitt, Wisconsin over WVU, Buffalo over Rutgers and North Carolina over Syracuse. Of those five, only the Mountaineers lost on the road.

Top-ranked Miami downed Florida and Boston College topped Stanford. No. 11 Virginia Tech was idle, sitting out before a 47-21 win the following Thursday over Marshall.

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WHATEVER transpires on the field this season, the 2008 West Virginia team already has a school record. WVU has sold 38,131 season tickets to Mountaineer Field - and Deputy AD Mike Parsons said Tuesday that a handful more may be sold.

Those are full-season packages, no mini-deals (WVU halted those three-game packages after the 2006 season). The full season ticket record of 38,037 was set last year.

The combined full- and partial-season record was 41,206 in 1998 (including 7,510 mini-packages).

Contact Sports Editor Jack Bogaczyk at ja...@dailymail.com or (304) 348-7949.