The Mountaineer Sports Network from Learfield IMG College is pleased to present, in conjunction with corporate partners and radio affiliate partners throughout the state, classic WVU radio broadcasts from recent history made available to fans through a combination of terrestrial radio and on-demand digital platforms.

Today's replay is West Virginia's 31-9 victory over 14th-ranked Syracuse at Mountaineer Field on Nov. 19, 1988 to conclude the first-ever unbeaten, untied regular season in school history.

Presented by West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources
 


MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – It was the only time West Virginia players were ever asked to return to the field to take a victory lap after a home win.
 
And for good reason – coach Don Nehlen's Mountaineers' 31-9 win over 14^th-ranked Syracuse on Nov. 19, 1988 gave them their first undefeated, untied regular season record in school history.
 
Tonight, you can relive that great memory as part of our continuing Mountaineer Memory series of games airing on MSN affiliates and digital platforms that will conclude next Monday night with West Virginia's great 2006 Nokia Sugar Bowl victory over Georgia.
 
The Syracuse triumph holds special meaning to Morgantown High product Willie Edwards, who made the play of the game in the third quarter when he intercepted Todd Philcox's pass on the far side of the field and returned it 49 yards for a touchdown.
 
Edwards' pick-six turned a once pensive Mountaineer Field upside down. 
 
After that the party was on!
 
Edwards said he studied that play on film and knew exactly where Philcox was going to go with the football as the play unfolded.
 
"I was the boundary corner so my deal was I watched film," he explained. "I liked to know their tendencies, and I looked at the way they lined up and I was like, 'Alright, they are lined up like this and this is what they are going to do.' 
 
"I kind of knew what was going to happen with (fullback Darryl) Johnston coming out in the flat, and I was playing a squat corner. I kind of pressed the receiver and dropped back, but when I saw Johnston coming I said, 'That's going to be the easy throw for this quarterback.' I jumped it and I almost ran past it because I jumped it so quick," he said.
 
"I kind of tipped it, bobbled it a little bit, and caught it and then just went down the sideline," he added.
 
Edward kept running down the sideline all the way into the end zone. His score put West Virginia ahead 21-3 and after that, there was no way Syracuse had enough left in the tank to make up that difference.
 
Edwards said he actually visualized that play happening the night before when the team was staying out at Lakeview Resort.
 
"We were sitting around talking, and some of the other DBs had pick sixes and were getting on me, 'When are you going to get one?' They were making fun of me about not having one," Edwards recalled. "So, before the game, coach Nehlen had us all sitting in the team room and he flipped the lights off and he said, 'I want it quiet in here and I want you to think about what you are going to do out on that field tonight. What play are you going to make?' In my mind, I wanted a pick six so I had envisioned in my mind that it was going to happen."
 
It did, although Edwards wasn't completely sold on Nehlen's visualization techniques at the time.
 
"That stuff usually doesn't register with 18-, 19-year-olds, but when it happens you think, 'Maybe there is something to it …'" he laughed.
 
Afterward, Edwards actually did a little too much celebrating with his teammates on the sidelines.
 
"I was also on the kickoff team so I was still on the sidelines celebrating and forgot to go out for the kickoff team," he said. "After making that play, I got my ass ripped by my special teams coach!"
 
That was the only thing Willie did wrong that night – or his teammates for that matter.
 
Syracuse finished with just 316 total yards and nine points in perhaps West Virginia's best defensive performance of the season. The Orange had a good number of players back from an undefeated team in 1987 that tied Auburn in the Sugar Bowl.
 
Syracuse's biggest road block in '87 came against West Virginia in the regular season finale when it needed a two-point conversion to stave off the Mountaineers 32-31 in the Carrier Dome.
 
Edwards said that loss was still fresh in the players' minds when the two teams met a year later in Morgantown.
 
"That one we definitely remembered because we played an excellent game (in '87)," Edwards admitted. "They ran the option on the goal line and they scored, but we thought we were just as good as them. We still had that in the back of our minds, but we also wanted to finish off the season 11-0 for the first time in the history of West Virginia football."
 
Edwards remembers the only negative from that night was the season-ending injury starting free safety Darrell Whitmore sustained.
 
"That was the one thing about that game I would take back," he admitted. "If I could have traded my interception for Darrell Whitmore being healthy that would have been a no-brainer. I knew how much he meant to our defense that year. Talk about an athlete …"
 
Whitmore's injury really changed the makeup of West Virginia's defense when it faced top-ranked Notre Dame in the Fiesta Bowl for the national championship.
 
Starting strong safety Bo Orlando was forced to play free safety against the Irish, which took him away from the line of scrimmage where he really thrived.
 
"We played 11 games with Bo at the line of scrimmage, and he was an enforcer," Edwards explained. "Now, you put him back at free safety, and you can't fault him for creeping (up to the line of scrimmage) a little bit because that's what he did all year. That kind of changed the dynamic of our defense."
 
Looking back on that '88 West Virginia team, people usually associate it with quarterback Major Harris and the Mountaineers' high-powered offense, but the defense had a number of great players on it as well.
 
Renaldo Turnbull, Mike Fox and Orlando each had long and successful NFL careers. Alvoid Mays won a Super Bowl with the Washington Redskins and backup linebacker Steve Grant played six pro seasons with the Indianapolis Colts.
 
Defensive tackle Chris Parker was a tremendous college football player as was linebacker Chris Haering, who came from great bloodlines and knew the game as well as the defensive coaches. And Edwards maintains Whitmore was destined for gridiron stardom had he not suffered a broken leg and gravitated toward a baseball career.
 
There was also linebacker Theron Ellis, perhaps the most physically gifted player on the team, and outside linebacker Robert Pickett, who was among the first really good players Don Nehlen managed to sign out of Florida.
 
Edwards said he still lives in Morgantown where he now works for the FBI Center in Clarksburg. He also spent 17 years as an assistant football coach at his high school alma mater before giving that up in 2017.
 
Edwards and running back Tony Johnson were the two best players on MHS's 1983 team coached by the late Vic Bonfili that defeated Barboursville in the Class 3A state championship game.
 
Both players ended up signing with WVU, but Johnson's college football career never blossomed the way Edwards' did.
 
Willie made 86 tackles and intercepted seven passes in 37 career games for the Mountaineers, culminating with 11 victories and a trip to play in the national championship game against Notre Dame.
 
"The thing about it was we all genuinely liked each other," Edwards said of the '88 team.