Iowa State trails West Virginia 17-14 at halftime in its regular season finale at Jack Trice Stadium. This is the first-ever meeting between the two teams.

West Virginia (5-5, 2-5 Big 12) came out firing on its opening drive with a 9-play, 42-yard campaign that resulted in a 42-yard field goal to take a 3-0 lead.

The Mountaineers continued to own the battle at the line of scrimmage on offense, accumulating seven first downs in their first two drives.

Quarterback Sam Richardson got the first start of his career after his five-touchdown performance against Kansas last week. The redshirt freshman played the first quarter calm and collectively before pulling the trigger too early on plays and scrambling with options wide open in a more frantic manner.

Iowa State (6-5, 3-5) finally got on the board midway through the second quarter with a 10-play, 69-yard drive that resulted in an 8-yard touchdown pass from Richardson to redshirt senior receiver Jerome Tiller. The touchdown reception was the first-ever for Tiller, who converted from quarterback to receiver after spending the 2011 season academically ineligible.

West Virginia answered, however, with an 8-play, 70-yard touchdown drive that took up almost four minutes in time of possession. At the end of the half, Smith’s stat line read 11-of-16 in passing for 105 yards and one touchdown.

Richardson went out gunning for a last-second scoring drive to close the half, finding Josh Lenz in the end zone after scrambling 21 yards on fourth down with a six-man blitz in his face. With that score, the Cyclones entered the locker room trailing 17-14.

Richardson finished the half 9-of-17 for 105 yards and two touchdowns.

Iowa State will kick off to begin the second half.