No. 20: Rutgers, 2006
June 19, 2010 09:36 AM | General
July 11, 2010
Pat White could barely walk the week leading into the Rutgers game. He injured his toe during West Virginia's 45-27 victory at Pitt two weeks prior and then sprained his ankle in the fourth quarter of a 24-19 loss to South Florida the week before.
"I'm not sure which one bothers him more," said West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez. "They're both issues."
White tried to give it a go during warm-ups before telling the coaches that he couldn't play. Then word was relayed to backup quarterback Jarrett Brown to get ready because he was starting.
Brown had very little game action up to that point, completing 14 of 18 passes for 140 yards, most of that coming in a mop-up role against Eastern Washington.
Brown struggled at the outset, completing just 4 of his first 11 passes and rushing for 9 yards on 12 attempts.
"At halftime, I looked over my mistakes and corrected them," Brown said. "I was being anxious in the first quarter and having happy feet in the second quarter. I came out more poised in the second half."
He sure did.
Brown finished the night 14 of 29 passing for 244 yards and a touchdown and he also ran 17 times for 73 yards to help the Mountaineers to a 41-39 triple-overtime victory over 13th-ranked Rutgers and ruin the Scarlet Knights' dreams of a BCS bowl berth.
A perennial loser, Rutgers won its first nine games before being upset at Cincinnati, then rebounded to defeat Syracuse to set up what would have been a historic victory at West Virginia.
But Brown had different ideas, first putting WVU into position to win the game when Pat McAfee kicked a 30-yard field goal with 53 seconds left to send the game into overtime.
In the extra session, Brown completed a big third-down pass to Brandon Myles during the first overtime to set up Steve Slaton's 1-yard TD run. He hooked up again with Myles for 22 yards for the go-ahead score in the third overtime and then found Dorrell Jalloh in the back of the end zone for the two-point conversion to give the Mountaineers a 41-33 lead.
Rutgers scored on its possession to make it 41-39, but Mike Teel's two-point conversion pass to Ray Rice was knocked down by Vaughn Rivers. Fans and players ran onto the field to celebrate the victory.
"What a ball game," said Rodriguez. "No one panicked tonight."
Slaton bounced back from his worst rushing performance of the season versus South Florida to run for 112 yards and score two touchdowns against Rutgers.
Ray Rice led the Knights with a game-high 129 yards rushing - 90 of those coming after the first half. Teel was 19 of 26 passing for 278 yards.
After the game West Virginia accepted an invitation to play Georgia Tech in the Gator Bowl while Rutgers fell all the way down to the Texas Bowl to play Kansas State.
