Hopefully we'll see some good stories over the next few weeks. I'm sure many would be interested if other links are posted.

Dan Wetzel WVU

Country road less traveled

By Dan Wetzel, Yahoo! Sports
November 26, 2007

West Virginia's greatest export isn't coal. It's talent.

If you grow up in West Virginia and develop skills and dreams in certain walks of life, often there isn't a way to embrace them without leaving. It's a state of remarkable beauty and deep values but cultural and economic realities force so many talented people to head off elsewhere – from the symphony to the stock market. Not everyone, but many.

It's like that in a lot of small places and West Virginia is made up exclusively of small places.

Rich Rodriguez grew up in one of them, Grant Town, a 600-person, no stoplight town not far from Morgantown, where he played football and is currently coach of the West Virginia Mountaineers.

Sunday he was preparing his team for its regular-season finale against Pitt, where a victory would assure a trip to the BCS championship game.

But about 50 weeks ago, he faced a decision so many West Virginians struggle with. The University of Alabama had offered him not just its head coaching position, but all of its rich tradition, its grand possibilities and, of course, its pile of money.

At Alabama, conventional wisdom said, you could climb to the top of your profession. The school claims 12 national titles. West Virginia claims none, a program that's often good, but rarely great.

"We like to think we have some (tradition) but we don't have national championship tradition," Rodriguez admitted.

Rodriguez had watched his former coach and mentor, Don Nehlen, stay in Morgantown for 21 seasons and never quite get the program to the ultimate heights (although it had a shot at the national title in 1988), mainly because of the recruiting limitations of a state with just 1.8 million residents.

"When you fly over other states, you see houses," Nehlen always said. "When you fly over West Virginia, all you see are trees."

So a year ago, there was that inevitable West Virginia fork in the road for Rodriguez. He was a bright, ambitious 43-year-old who had done great work at home – at two smaller state schools and then WVU – but now had to choose. Would it be the untold potential of Alabama, or the familiar, if possibly limited, life at home?

"By God," he told his team on Dec. 9, 2006, "I'm staying at West Virginia."

Staying in West "By God" Virginia was never a smarter choice.

"I just thought, 'you know, we can accomplish anything right here,'" Rodriguez said last spring in his office in Morgantown.

It was a move that stunned the coaching establishment; and much of Alabama too. But for Rodriguez this wasn't about curbing dreams, settling in an effort to balance family (his parents still live just a 40-minute drive away) or choosing comfort over ambition.

Rodriguez, instead, chose both. He admits he doesn't spend much time with his family or old friends since the job is too consuming. But at least theoretically he has the chance; all while driving hard for the top anyway.

"I believe in this school, in this program," he said last spring. "We can compete for a national title here."..........................

USA Today WVU

West Virginia on steady upward climb
By Jon Saraceno, USA TODAY

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Meet America's new No. 1, the one not from the "Show Me" state. This team has cruised below radar since late September, even as many of college football's elite contenders crashed and burned. Then again, the way this unpredictable season has spun out of control, West Virginia might not last long in the pilot's seat as it attempts to survive poll prosperity, archrival Pitt and BCS hell.
The Mountaineers (10-1) are top-ranked in the USA TODAY Coaches' Poll, No. 2 in the Associated Press media poll after Missouri — a cursed spot in '07. In the last eight weeks, the team ranked second in the AP media poll has lost six times. In the USA TODAY poll, eight out of the last nine weeks has produced at least one top-three team defeat.

Get those West Virginia zingers in while you can.

Let's give WVU its just due. The Mountaineers, winners of 32 of their last 36 games, are a very good football team. Maybe, just maybe, they are the best college football team in the country — not that we will ever really know thanks to our current system.

As West Virginia's Pat White walked off the field Saturday night with a smile as wide as the Blue Ridge, the quarterback joined Mountaineers faithful in John Denver's Take Me Home, Country Roads. That path could very well lead to the national championship game in New Orleans, bolstered if West Virginia defeats the lowly Panthers in the 100th Backyard Brawl.

"It definitely has been a wild year of ups and downs for college football," said White, whose Mountaineers crushed Connecticut 66-21 to win the Big East title. "We wanted to finish this game strong."

White was being polite. In the third quarter, West Virginia stormed for 259 of its 517 rushing yards. In all, its lethal spread-option offense punctured the end zone eight times and amassed 624 total yards.

When it comes to football DNA, decoding West Virginia's genetic football blueprint begins with its quarterback. I think White is the most exciting player in the nation. At 6-2, 190, the junior may also be the best pound-for-pounder when it comes to bronze trophies.

"There he goes — strike a pose," teased Mountaineers safety Ryan Mundy as White greeted the media.

White won't make anyone's first team All-Quotable. No matter. The fleet playmaker from Alabama belongs on any Heisman voter's list for serious consideration.

He accelerates like a Ferrari. His moves? Just plain sick. White puts the zig in zag, the wiggle in waggle. He's an efficient passer, too. Against UConn, the elusive quarterback ran wild for 186 yards on only 16 carries, scored two touchdowns and passed for another. During one downfield dash, he gave some poor UConn defender a stiff-arm, knocking him flat, leaving White to remark, "That came out of nowhere — I was excited."

Like all great players, the quarterback confirmed that he relies upon his instincts. "I just play," he said. "I don't know what I see (or) what I feel. I just go."

Few, at any position, are tougher than the soft-spoken quarterback who enjoys spreading the wealth, and credit, with an explosive backfield that includes Steve Slaton and freshman running backs Noel Devine and Jock Sanders.

During the last two seasons, White has played with various injuries, including turf toe, a high ankle sprain and after being kicked in the head. Against UConn, he vomited several times. As reporters, microphones and cameras crowded White, seated on a couch, he started feeling dizzy. "I'm about to faint. Oh, man."

Defensive coordinators have the same reaction...........

:muttering: