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MORGANTOWN — Despite the many distractions that West Virginia threw at its fans at its spring football game on what was maybe the best day of this entire year to date, which included a concert, the revelation of new uniforms, celebrity coaches with the familiar names of Pat McAfee and Pat White, skill competitions that included not only players but fans, there were things the fans could take away from the festivities.

The first had less to do with the Mountaineers and more to do with the game of football itself, that being that football isn’t football without tackling.

The second thing is that while the uniforms are going to be either “I love it” or “I hate it” haberdashery, there was little doubt that there was no “I hate it” in the fans who mostly filled the lower level of Mountaineer Field to watch the spring game.

“We tried to make it fun, something different,” WVU coach Neal Brown said after the game, observing that the field was filled with kids when he left, saying “maybe future Mountaineers.”

Now, there is no doubt that Brown didn’t leave with that same feeling, for he understood that this was far from the finished product he hoped to put on display along with the new uniforms in the opening game against Penn State.

The play was neither crisp nor error free, the quarterbacks — both Garrett Greene and Nicco Marchiol — obviously still in the midst of making the necessary corrections from last year.

They combined to complete 18 of 32 passes, which is only 56.3%, not at all the goal they were shooting for. Those two did combine for 172 yards but there also were a couple of interceptions, among them three thrown during the scrimmage by all WVU QBs.

“Today Garrett was OK, not great, not bad,” Brown said.

But this brings us back to our first point, which is how football is not really football — certainly not entertaining football — without tackling. The rules in this game for most of the play was that the defense only had to touch the ball carrier and that took all the fun out of the game.

The lack of tackles is understood for safety reasons but it turns football into something it isn’t and starts with the fact that there were no collisions of the kind the WVU defense believes in — be it from the days where Karl Joseph was separating receivers from the football, and often their senses.

But more to the point it didn’t allow Greene to do what he does best, which is turn a defense into statues as he makes dips and cuts to break out of trouble. His frustration with the rules was obvious early.

“It’s hard on a guy like Garrett,” Brown noted. “He would have had a couple of explosive runs if they had had to tackle him and gone over 100 yards rushing. The stats would look a little different then.”

Greene admitted he would have liked to have tried to blow by people rather than hear the whistle blow. At one point he went to the back judge to ask about it.

“He said I should take to Coach Brown, that it was him blowing the whistle, not me,” Greene laughed.

And you can only guess how much easier it is to stop Jahiem White, who can run over or around you if all you have to do is stop him. This man who averaged more than 8 yards a touch last year had only 19 yards on 7 carries, which is 2.7 yards a carry, without getting his uniform dirty.

The only thing that really bothered Greene, Brown surmised, was on a trick double reverse play which ended in role reversal with Preston Fox throwing deep for Greene, only to have it go off his fingertips.

“I will say it was the sun,” Greene joked. “He threw a good ball and I got to bring that in.”

That play was not all the trickery that came out as Brown pretty much gave McAfee and White a free hand in running the show.

In fact, at one point, the defense lined up with about nine of the defenders in a line straight back from the center, looking very much like angry customers not happy about waiting in line at Walmart’s check out.

“There were times I didn’t know what we were in on defense,” Brown said.

It was not an angry crowd that left the stadium. In fact, the opposite was true, for it was a fun day in the sun, for there were a lot of individuals who made an impression, some of whom helped with the turnaround of the program last year and some who are expected to help carry it into the future.

Josiah Trotter, the heralded linebacker who is the son of a former NFL linebacker for the Philadelphia Eagles but was hurt last year, was in position to make a number of big hits and did grab off an interception.

Overall, though, it made for some good spirits, a nice day, presenting a strong impression for 25 or so recruits that Brown had in town for the game.

Oh, the score?

Can’t say I know. Didn’t really matter, anyway.

Morgantown now becomes a football free town now for a while before they regather for summer workouts.