Seventh number to come down in Morgantown
West Virginia retired Pat White’s No. 5 earlier today, in the hour before the Mountaineers opened their season against Coastal Carolina. He becomes only the seventh player in programme history to be honoured this way, a small figure for a school with more than a century of football behind it.
The jersey does not vanish immediately. Fifth-year player Jaden Bray keeps No. 5 through the end of this season, and only then does the number go out of service. West Virginia wore their all-white uniforms for the occasion and asked the crowd to turn up in white as well.
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The four-bowl quarterback
White’s case rests on a run no college quarterback had assembled before him. He started and won four consecutive bowl games, beginning with the 2006 Sugar Bowl against Georgia and closing with the 2008 Meineke Bowl against North Carolina, taking in the 2007 Gator Bowl against Georgia Tech and the 2008 Fiesta Bowl against Oklahoma in between. The West Virginia athletics department lists him as the first quarterback in the sport to do it.
The rest of the record survives inspection. He finished 35-8 as a starter and 7-2 against ranked opposition. When his career ended he held Big East marks for touchdowns responsible for, with 103, and for total offense, with 10,529 yards. His 4,480 rushing yards still rank third all time among college quarterbacks, behind Keenan Reynolds of Navy on 4,559 and Denard Robinson of Michigan on 4,495. Eighteen seasons later, 79 yards is all that separates him from the top of that list.
The professional years, and the return
Miami took White in the second round of the 2009 draft and waived him the following year. He spent time with the Virginia Destroyers of the United Football League, came back to the NFL as a backup in Washington, then finished with Edmonton in the Canadian Football League before retiring in 2015.
He is 40 now and back on the sideline he left, working as assistant quarterbacks coach and assistant to the head coach. That head coach is Rich Rodriguez, the man who recruited him and built an offense around his legs two decades ago.
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