MORGANTOWN, W.Va. -- Zac Cooper has this love-hate relationship with defense inside a confined area, usually a football field in the northwest corner of the Mountain State.

He hated playing defensive end and loved playing linebacker at Weir High, in Weirton just across the Pennsylvania border from Washington County, because scholastic linebacker was free and easy and instinctual and won him the Sam Huff Award for the state's stoutest defensive player.

And the detestable line? "I played defensive end in high school one year ... I don't want to get into that too much," he explained cryptically.

He hated linebacker at West Virginia University because in college football the position required a guy to align his certain shoulder with a certain shoulder of a certain offensive player, take certain steps, perform far too many certain tasks. And the desirable line?

"I hated being in a three-point stance and stuff," Cooper said, "but now I love it. I love it a whole lot more than playing linebacker."

In two football ports almost equidistant to Pittsburgh, in a pair of positions barely inches apart, Cooper keeps moving backward and forward, up and down in a stance. This time, he's down with the move forward to where he started, defensive end.

"Too much thinking," he said disdainfully of college linebacker. "I don't like to think too much. But I love this. I love defensive line. I love the idea of going heads up with a tackle every play. It's been a smooth transition."

Cooper knows transitions. First, he made a fruitful switch to high school linebacker in a state where few home-grown players at that position grow up to earn scholarships, let alone starting jobs, for the Mountaineers. He became captain on the 2004 all-state defense, finished second to former Mountaineers star Quincy Wilson in Weir rushing annals, helped to steer the Red Riders to consecutive state semifinals and won a scholarship to West Virginia.

Then, after a redshirt season and a redshirt-freshman year that began with a bruised-spine scare, Cooper found success last season backing up Marc Magro at the third-down rush end position ... and won a switch to college defensive end last spring.

"Zac Cooper, who is fast off the edge, just keeps doing better and better," West Virginia coach Bill Stewart said earlier in camp.

A 6-foot-3, 248-pound redshirt junior -- having added 28 pounds this past summer alone -- Cooper plays on the first-team line and may well start in the opener against Villanova. If so, he could give the Mountaineers two homegrown starters, the same as last season, once middle linebacker Reed Williams recovers from shoulder surgeries that could well scratch him from the Aug. 30 game at least.

Defensive line coach Bill Kirelawich talked after Saturday's scrimmage about experimenting in practice this week with a big, 275-pound-plus front in defensive tackle Pat Liebig, nose tackle Chris Neild and defensive end Scooter Berry, with Cooper and junior-college transfer Larry Ford book-ending a smaller, quicker line. Chances are, though, Cooper will play significant amounts this fall.

Cooper is not only bigger -- "He looks huuuuge to me," said mother Carrie -- but stronger than even last spring. His bench press hovers around 400 pounds and his squat at 560, all marked increases under new strength and conditioning coach Mike Joseph, who also monitored the growing defensive end's diet. "You can't do it eating junk food, you can't be going to McDonald's three days a week," Cooper said. "Stick with the carbs."

After that fright in August 2006, when then-coach Rich Rodriguez informed the media that Cooper's spinal MRI was clear even before the player's parents found out, there is another medical concern surrounding him this summer. Strangely, it apparently isn't tied to football.

Cooper in recent months has suffered from dizzy spells and blackouts that strike mostly when he's off the field or relaxing. He spent five days earlier in a university hospital, where doctors ran "every heart test imaginable," Cooper said.

"They almost had to tie him down because he wanted out of there so badly," Carrie Cooper said. "Plus, he lost six pounds. He was [peeved]."

"I've had concussions before. Who hasn't playing football?" said Zac Cooper, who is scheduled to see a neurologist in early September. He then added, "This is little different."

Just like defensive end from high school to college.