MORGANTOWN — Like most quarterbacks, West Virginia’s Scotty Fox Jr. wants nothing to do with donuts, but unlike most quarterbacks, it isn’t because the donut and its circular shape is often used to represent the zero that goes up on the scoreboard when a team is shut out.

Fox, you see, doesn’t eat processed foods, a fact revealed by his coach, Rich Rodriguez, on his Monday night radio show, which in a way not only was a celebration of Fox, despite his youth and inexperience, leading the Mountaineers to their first Big 12 victory of the season as they beat No 22 Houston on its home field.

That led the Big 12 to name Fox its Freshman of the Week after he completed 13 of 22 passes for 157 yards and a touchdown while rushing 10 times for 65 yards and two more touchdowns, including a crucial 24-yard scamper on fourth and four.

It led Rodriguez to the following observation after the game: “Our freshman quarterback is growing up. He was really poised seeing things out there and I was proud of the way he played.”

He is a different breed of quarterback, part of it being that there just aren’t many 18-year-olds who can handle all that goes with being the starting quarterback for a Power 4 football team or one who avoids eating processed foods.

“He’s a health nut,” Rodriguez said. “He does not eat processed food. I don’t even know what processed foods are.”

Well, for Rodriguez and those of you who are like him, a brief definition of processed foods is any food that has been altered from its original state through various methods such as adding ingredients, removing components such as fat or fiber, refining or cooking, freezing or canning.

Think of it this way. Eating an apple is good. Eating a candy apple, no matter how delicious, is not.

One thing is certain. Rodriguez isn’t going to mess with that part of his quarterback’s routine.

“If it helps him throw passes, I’m all for it,” the coach said.

It has been a whirlwind of a freshman season for Fox, who due to his inexperience started camp at the bottom of five potential Mountaineer quarterbacks that included Nicco Marchiol, Jaylen Henderson, Khalil Wilkins, Max Brown and him.

“He was a true freshman. We had three upperclassmen with Nicco, Jaylen and Max. We rated Kahlil, who was a redshirt, and Scotty as true freshmen,” Rodriguez explained. “They were the young bucks, fourth and fifth taking reps. Give them credit. They paid attention and stayed engaged.

“Then, as things happened, they were thrust into it a little bit earlier than we would have thought.”

Things that were happening were injuries, and pretty soon Rodriguez was down to Wilkens and Fox.

“You could see it with Scotty, in particular, ‘Hey, this guy can make some next-level throws and he’s extremely coachable,'” Rodriguez said.

But he was a freshman, which turned out to be both bad and good. It was bad in that he had much to learn, good in that he didn’t have to relearn things.

“Everybody may have different ways of doing things. Like transfers. They may have a certain way of doing things from how they were taught; not better than ours, just different than ours. They had different habits.

“But with Scotty, from Day 1, we told him this and to do things this way and that’s exactly how he was going to do it. I think that helped him along because all he’s known is our system since he’s been in college.

“You could see that system. He had the fastest release and maybe the strongest arm of all of them from the start. He’s getting better and better and is a football junkie, too. He’s around the facility all the time.”

His first start came two weeks back against TCU and he became WVU’s first true freshman to start a game in 73 years and first ever to throw for 300 yards when he passed for 301 yards.

He was playing and learning at the same time.

“It’s funny, you are teaching them how to throw, things like his arm angle and stuff. But you look at the footwork, if you have to teach them that in college, it’s not good. They can either throw or can’t throw by the time they get here or you got the wrong guy,” Rodriguez said.

He could throw, allowing Rodriguez to work on other things with him and Fox was an eager learner.

“What you work on is the timing, the drop relative to the route … that’s the biggest difference. You teach them on a catch and throw, on a 3 and throw, an RPO, is it a fake and throw, throwing on your first step or your fifth step rolling out.

“So, the timing of it is what you have to teach relative to your system. But as far as how to throw, I just want to make sure it gets from Point A to Point B with the timing and right accuracy and right trajectory.”

The way Rodriguez, working with his son and QB coach Rhett, teach it is there are three different-type passes. Rhett Rodriguez uses No. 1, 2 and 3 to designate whether it’s a high pass, a pass that is sort of a “half moon” in its arc , or a line drive pass.

“Rhett knows the numbers. I didn’t. I used the old clothes line, but you tell a kid about a clothes line today and they ask you what it is,” he said. “Have you not been out around West Virginia? It goes from one pole to another and has an inverted trajectory, sags in the middle. Don’t you know what a clothes line is? It usually goes from your trailer porch to your satellite dish.”

In Cleveland, where Fox grew up, they use dryers, not clotheslines.

The running part of it is something that he could handle but the running plays were more complicated than he’d seen in high school, as much of them were RPOs, or run/pass options.

“We have such a variety of quarterback runs, which we didn’t really call many of because we don’t want to get him roughed up the way our quarterback situation is,” Rodriguez said. “We called a couple at key times but for the most part we stayed away from that.

“What you have to do is feature that guy who does well. You have to have the ability to do a little bit of everything because they have the ability to take certain things away. If they do that, you have a gift of something else and have to be able to take advantage of it whether it’s an easy throw or a quarterback run.”

But that fourth-and-24 touchdown run was an RPO Rodriguez had to call.

“That was another RPO, but it wasn’t a draw RPO. A lot of times the quarterback runs it in and everybody yells it’s a draw. But actually, it was an inside zone,” Rodriguez said. “It’s a little bit different look. We have two vertical routes on the outside and two hitches on the outside of that and he just reads the box, from tackle to tackle about 6 yards deep. If it’s a light box, he can hit it or if it’s a heavy box and he can throw it.

“If it’s an in-between box he can start to run and then throw it. It’s an easy read for him.”

He made the right read and went the distance without being touched.