West Virginia Welcomes Wealthy Rodriguez House – West Virginia College Athletics

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – An emotional Wealthy Rodriguez was re-introduced to Mountaineer Nation Friday afternoon contained in the WVU Coliseum.
 
Rodriguez, suppressing tears and stopping a number of instances to gather himself, spent quarter-hour making an attempt to place into phrases what has transpired in his life over the previous 17 years.
 
There have been stops in Michigan, Arizona, Mississippi, Hawaii, Louisiana and Alabama earlier than lastly returning to the place the place all of it started – West Virginia.
 
The Grant City native performed at North Marion Excessive, then at West Virginia College for Corridor of Fame coach Don Nehlen earlier than Nehlen gave him his first teaching job as a pupil assistant in 1985.
 
That led to a head teaching alternative at Salem School, and when Salem disbanded its soccer program, Nehlen introduced him again as a graduate assistant coach in 1989.
 
A yr later, Rodriguez turned the coach at resource-depleted Glenville State and led that program to the NAIA nationwide championship recreation in 1993.
 
4 years later, Rodriguez hitched his wagon to former WVU participant Tommy Bowden, they usually made stops at Tulane and Clemson earlier than Rodriguez changed Nehlen at West Virginia in 2001.
 
Six years, 60 wins and three consecutive top-10 seasons turned Rodriguez into one of many hottest teaching names within the nation. Then got here the lengthy, unusual odyssey that has lastly introduced him again to Virtually Heaven.
 
A number of instances, Rodriguez used the phrase “mistake” to characterize his resolution to go away his soccer workforce after its 13-9 loss to Pitt that value West Virginia the chance to play within the BCS nationwide championship recreation – a recreation Rodriguez’s workforce was ok to win that yr!
 
As a substitute, he opted to go to Michigan to educate the Wolverines and left his workforce to interim coach Invoice Stewart, who led the Mountaineers to a surprising 48-28 victory over third-ranked Oklahoma within the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl.
 
The uncooked emotion of that call was on show in the present day when a protestor was ushered out of the world earlier than Rodriguez may handle the followers and a nationwide tv viewers on the Pat McAfee Present, broadcast stay on ESPN.
 
“I’ve considered this second,” Rodriguez stated, pausing one other second to gather himself. “I get to educate on the biggest College within the nation. I get to stay within the biggest state within the union. And extra importantly, I get to be across the biggest individuals that you could be round. Thanks very a lot.”
 
Rodriguez thanked his household – his spouse, Rita, daughter, Raquel and son, Rhett, who had been at his first press convention 23 years in the past in a banquet room at the back of the Milan Puskar Heart, which is now a part of his workplace overlooking the sphere.
 
Raquel and Rhett had been simply small then and Rhett was really asleep in his mom’s arms that chilly December afternoon.
 
He additionally acknowledged his mom, Arlene, his brothers Steve and Kenny, and his mother-in-law and sister-in-law.
 
“There are some cousins right here that I have never seen in a very very long time,” he stated. “There are such a lot of individuals right here in the present day that had been right here 17 years in the past after I made that mistake of leaving right here. It tells me they nonetheless love this place, as I do.”
 
He singled out Nehlen, who was sitting on the ground within the second row. He even took a query from former participant Avon Cobourne, sitting straight in entrance of him. Avon now does some podcasting, which is how he was in a position to snag a credential for the occasion.
 
And naturally, he talked about McAfee, who turned what has usually been an area taking place right into a nationwide occasion.
 
“I need each participant who performed for each coach right here, each former athlete, you might be at all times welcome to return again house to West Virginia,” he stated.
 
Rodriguez steadily interrupted himself to inform tales about a few of his gamers, whether or not it was Owen Schmitt exhibiting up in the future together with his mother and a field of VHS spotlight tapes for him to observe, or Pacman Jones Facetiming him on New Yr’s Eve from South Seashore in a lodge room together with his household.
 
Rodriguez thanked the administration at Jacksonville State for giving him a chance to construct that program into Convention USA champions this yr.
 
“It is an amazing college, and I admire them,” he stated.
 
He talked about methods he is grown over time, the dues he is paid to go from being an influence convention coach at Michigan and Arizona to a tv analyst to an offensive coordinator to an off-the-field analyst to transitioning an FCS program right into a Convention USA champion.
 
“How can I make myself higher, not solely as a coach however at an individual?” he defined. “What can I study to develop and change into the perfect model of myself and assist individuals change into the perfect variations of themselves? I needed to do it by studying from my errors, and in case you simply keep the place you might be at, you’ll at all times be the place you might be at.
 
“There is just one college within the nation that I can say I coached at the place I do know the city, I do know what it is wish to be a pupil there, I do know what it is wish to be an athlete there, I do know what it is wish to stay in that state and I do know what it is wish to work there. That is West Virginia College,” he stated.
 
There have been many acquainted faces among the many 2,500 or so milling about in the present day within the Coliseum reminiscing about happier instances and dreaming about what lies forward.
 
So, what lies forward?
 
“Our gamers will play more durable than anyone within the nation,” Rodriguez predicted. “I say this to my gamers on a regular basis, ‘Lots of people within the stands, they may not know the Xs and Os, however that is okay. They won’t know all of the schemes that they are watching, however they’ll sit within the stands, particularly at West Virginia, and watch their workforce and inform if they’re taking part in onerous.
 
“I do not make a variety of guarantees, however the one factor I promise you, whenever you watch West Virginia gamers play, they are going to play their asses off!”
 
That is what we remembered about these Wealthy Rodriguez West Virginia soccer groups he coached again within the 2000s.
 
They performed onerous, they performed robust, and most significantly, they gained.
 
The Mountaineer soccer contained in the Coliseum in the present day, and the 1000’s extra all through the nation watching on ESPN, are dying for a winner right here once more.
 
Rodriguez indicated in the present day that this might be his final teaching job. 
 
If he can ship and get West Virginia soccer again to the place it was 17 years in the past when he left right here, it may one helluva ending to a tremendous story!