Tales from the Backyard Brawl
November 29, 2007 09:07 AM | General
November 29, 2007
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - Darryl Talley’s path to NFL stardom began in Pittsburgh on Oct. 2, 1982. It was on that day that the rest of the country got to see what West Virginians already knew: Darryl Talley was one bad dude.
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| Linebacker Darryl Talley earned consensus All-America honors in 1982.
WVU Sports Communications |
Everything Talley could do on a football field was on display that afternoon against the No. 2-rated Panthers. He blocked a punt for a safety. He intercepted a Dan Marino pass. He lined up at just about every position on the field except for nose tackle, flexing out to cover slot receivers in passing situations, lining up over the tackle to pressure the quarterback, and chasing down Panther ball carries Bryan Thomas and Marlon McIntyre.
“That game is part of what drove me in the NFL because I had tried every way in the world to beat Dan Marino when he was at Pitt. I had games where I had 25 tackles, blocked kicks, intercepted passes and did everything I thought I could do,” Talley said. “I covered wide receivers and running backs … everybody and I couldn’t do it. We just didn’t have enough horses to beat them.”
Talley’s journey to West Virginia from East Cleveland, Ohio, is a story in itself. As unbelievable as it sounds, Talley was just 5-feet-6 inches tall the summer before his senior season at Shaw High School. He grew seven inches during the summer.
“I broke my ankle in summer conditioning and I remember that I had to keep adjusting my crutches because the ground kept getting further away,” Talley said. “When my mom went to buy my school clothes for the year she bought the same size as the year before. They fit in my waist and everything but I had floods on.”
Injuries limited Talley to only three football games his senior season, but that was enough to impressive college recruiters.
“I told Iowa and Iowa State that they were too far away from my home. Craig Wolfley, Jim Morris and Art Monk were at Syracuse when I visited. They were just finishing up the Dome and I almost went to Syracuse. A buddy of mine, Anthony Jackson, we decided to go to the same school but when he picked Michigan I decided on West Virginia.”
When Talley arrived at West Virginia he weighed just 160 pounds, but he thought he was going to play right away.
“I get to West Virginia and after I’m there I look around at the three inside linebackers they brought in that year … I go out and make the travel squad for the second game against Oklahoma and I’m thinking to myself, ‘Wow, why ain’t I playing?’ I told them that I can at least run and catch them coach.”
Don Nehlen’s first impression of Talley when he took over the team in 1980 wasn’t a favorable one.
“When I came here somebody took a picture of West Virginia’s sideline and Darryl Talley was either sleeping on the bench or had his head back and his eyes were closed,” Nehlen said. “The picture doesn’t tell you if he was sleeping but his eyes were closes and his legs were hanging out.”
Talley readily admits that he was asleep. The team West Virginia was playing was Pitt.
“It was 1978 and I had number 45 on and it was the year they were redshirting me,” Talley said. “We were playing Pitt in the snake pit (Old Mountaineer Field) and I was sleeping, I’ll admit it. I went to sleep. I couldn’t play and they weren’t going to let me do anything and back then I was a kid from the city and I believed that I could play as well as anybody out there and I didn’t feel I was given the chance to play.
“I got mad and I went down on the end of the bench and I went to sleep,” Talley said.
When he finally got the opportunity to play as a 185-pound linebacker in 1979, the experiences were difficult playing for a team going through its fourth consecutive losing season. Talley distinctly remembers a butt whipping West Virginia endured against Penn State.
“I was playing outside linebacker and I went to take on a student-body sweep. I hit (Mike) Munchak, (Sean) Farrell and Matt Suhey at the same time. They knocked my helmet off my head and I got in line with their sweep and was running down the field trying to chase them while trying to put my helmet back on,” Talley laughed.
Three years later Talley was a consensus All-American, sewing up the award against Pitt in 1982.
“That game was on television and it was probably the first time in a long time a West Virginia player was named Chevrolet player of the game,” Talley said. “That got me on the map and got me on everybody’s radar screens.”
There is no greater West Virginia sports authority than Mickey Furfari and he believes Talley’s performance against Pitt was the best ever produced by a West Virginia player.
“No question in my mind,” Furfari said. “Talley was the best defensive player on the field that afternoon and Pitt had some great defensive players that year.”
Ironically, Talley says a play that he didn’t make in the Pitt game was what really whetted the pro scouts’ appetites.
“Bryan Thomas made a long run and I tried to run him down from the backside,” Talley recalled. “I ran close enough but never really caught him. That was when people really realized that I could run.”
One of Talley’s biggest regrets was not being able to knock off the Panthers in four tries. He believes the West Virginia-Pitt game is every bit as intense as the Michigan-Ohio State – just not as hyped.
“I think it’s on the same plane,” he said. “Woody Hayes wouldn’t allow his players to say Michigan. They had to refer to the team up north. That’s how they went about it.
“But when you talk about the rivalry between Pitt and West Virginia it is a historic game,” Talley said. “It is almost like the Hatfields and the McCoys. I don’t hate Pitt, but I don’t necessarily like them either.”
