Another Major Accomplishment for a Mountaineer Legend
July 02, 2021 03:00 PM | Football, Blog
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Everybody knows the play, the one when quarterback Major Harris ran 37 and the rest of the team ran 38 against Penn State.
Major, alone on an island, dodged Nittany Lion after Nittany Lion who were coming after him like sharks in a feeding frenzy as he glided into the end zone holding the football above his head. When you can get Jack Fleming scrambling for words you've really accomplished something. It was the most gorgeous 26-yard run we'd ever seen and it helped propel West Virginia to a 51-30 victory over Penn State in 1988 - those 51 points the most a Joe Paterno-coached football team ever surrendered.
The beauty of that play wasn't just that Harris had out-maneuvered at least seven different Penn State defenders on his own, making them all look like a bunch of Charlie Browns trying to kick a football. No, for me the real magnificence of that play was the fact that Harris' forgetfulness actually fooled those smarter and much savvier Nittany Lions.
You see, Penn State had always had the upper hand on West Virginia for two reasons: one, because the Nittanys were usually better than the Mountaineers and, two, because they were always much smarter.
For years and years, West Virginians would always complain about the bad breaks and bad bounces of the football that never seemed to go the Mountaineers' way whenever they played Penn State. What most of them failed to take into account was that many of those bad breaks and bad bounces were caused by well-schooled Penn State players.
I remember tight end Scott MacDonald once making a long catch and was about to score a touchdown during a game up at Penn State when trailing linebacker Greg Buttle alertly saw MacDonald carrying the football like a loaf of bread, knocked it out of his arm and recovered MacDonald's fumble.
I don't think WVU ever got close to the goal line again that afternoon.
Stuff like that was like Groundhog Day whenever West Virginia played Penn State.
My old New Martinsville buddy Nate Rine, a starting tight end for the Mountaineers in the early 1990s, once told me a story about the time he broke the huddle and came up to the line of scrimmage listening to the Penn State defenders shouting out in unison the formation, where the play was headed and who was getting the football.
"I got down in my three-point stance listening to them calling out everything we're doing and I'm thinking to myself, 'yep, yep, yep, yep,'" Rine recalled with a wide grin on his face. "Everyone was there before the ball was even snapped!"
I'm sure that was also the case in 1988 with Scott Gob, Andre Collins, Keith Karpinski and Quintus McDonald when Harris took off with the football. They knew exactly where Harris was supposed to go, as did Harris' teammates. But he didn't go there! It's almost as if Bluto Blutarsky stole the wrong test and everybody in the Delta House still got As - that's why I've always appreciated so much what Major did to Penn State on that broken play.
Someone wearing a gold and blue jersey had finally put one over on Paterno's team.
As retired ESPN announcer and silent Mountaineer supporter Mike Patrick once told me, "For all of the long-suffering WVU fans watching that game, (that Harris play) took 25 years of frustration away."
Among the legion of long-suffering West Virginians was secondary coach Steve Dunlap, whose playing career at WVU included a 62-14 loss to Penn State in 1973, a 21-12 setback in 1974 and a 39-0 defeat in 1975.
To this day, he's still pissed at safety Rich Rodriguez for filling the wrong gap on D.J. Dozier's long touchdown run in West Virginia's landmark 17-14 victory over Penn State in 1984. Had Rich Rod gone to the right hole, the final score would have been 17-7 instead.
So naturally, Dunlap, sitting in the press box, watched with glee as Harris and his teammates ran up and down the field on Jerry Sandusky's vaunted Penn State defense like a hot knife through butter. All of the coaches were still in the booth when Nehlen waved the white flag and called a draw play for Undra Johnson to run out the clock and end the half.
Up 34-8 at the time, Nehlen was more than content to go into the locker room with a 26-point lead, but Sandusky, for some reason, called an all-out blitz and that stupid draw play the Mountaineer fans used to include in their Don Nehlen Up-The-Middle-Meters turned into a 55-yard touchdown run.
"I couldn't believe it," Nehlen admitted years later. "I'm watching all of these guys leaving their area where Undra is going thinking, 'Oh boy, this is going to be pretty good!'"
Undra was so fast that he beat the game clock by three seconds, requiring West Virginia to squib-kick the ball to end the first half before the players could run to the locker room like a pack of wild dogs to begin planning their Sunnyside incursions for later that night.
Dunlap purposely held the press box elevator for Sandusky so he could pat him on the back and console him a little bit, "Hang in there, Jerry, you'll be alright," he told him.
"Now that was fun," Dunlap chuckled.
It was fun because Major Harris made the games fun for all of us.
Years later, Harris admitted those four years at West Virginia from 1986-89 were the best four years of his life, and yes, he regrets not spending a fifth one at WVU in 1990 as well.
"Once you get to college, I think that's why a lot of people say college was the best times of their lives because it's an experience that you'll never get again," Harris once said. "I will say this, if I had to go back in any time in my life, I'd want to go back to that time I spent in college at West Virginia."
If Uncle Rico's Time Machine Module actually worked, we'd all set the dial back to 1988, strap that electrical contraption around our waists and try and relive the greatest football season in Mountaineer history.
Congratulations, Major, on getting your No. 9 officially retired earlier today. You deserve it!
And, all of these years later, thanks again for finally putting one on those old Nittanys!
Major, alone on an island, dodged Nittany Lion after Nittany Lion who were coming after him like sharks in a feeding frenzy as he glided into the end zone holding the football above his head. When you can get Jack Fleming scrambling for words you've really accomplished something. It was the most gorgeous 26-yard run we'd ever seen and it helped propel West Virginia to a 51-30 victory over Penn State in 1988 - those 51 points the most a Joe Paterno-coached football team ever surrendered.
The beauty of that play wasn't just that Harris had out-maneuvered at least seven different Penn State defenders on his own, making them all look like a bunch of Charlie Browns trying to kick a football. No, for me the real magnificence of that play was the fact that Harris' forgetfulness actually fooled those smarter and much savvier Nittany Lions.
You see, Penn State had always had the upper hand on West Virginia for two reasons: one, because the Nittanys were usually better than the Mountaineers and, two, because they were always much smarter.
For years and years, West Virginians would always complain about the bad breaks and bad bounces of the football that never seemed to go the Mountaineers' way whenever they played Penn State. What most of them failed to take into account was that many of those bad breaks and bad bounces were caused by well-schooled Penn State players.
I remember tight end Scott MacDonald once making a long catch and was about to score a touchdown during a game up at Penn State when trailing linebacker Greg Buttle alertly saw MacDonald carrying the football like a loaf of bread, knocked it out of his arm and recovered MacDonald's fumble.
I don't think WVU ever got close to the goal line again that afternoon.
Stuff like that was like Groundhog Day whenever West Virginia played Penn State.
My old New Martinsville buddy Nate Rine, a starting tight end for the Mountaineers in the early 1990s, once told me a story about the time he broke the huddle and came up to the line of scrimmage listening to the Penn State defenders shouting out in unison the formation, where the play was headed and who was getting the football.
"I got down in my three-point stance listening to them calling out everything we're doing and I'm thinking to myself, 'yep, yep, yep, yep,'" Rine recalled with a wide grin on his face. "Everyone was there before the ball was even snapped!"
I'm sure that was also the case in 1988 with Scott Gob, Andre Collins, Keith Karpinski and Quintus McDonald when Harris took off with the football. They knew exactly where Harris was supposed to go, as did Harris' teammates. But he didn't go there! It's almost as if Bluto Blutarsky stole the wrong test and everybody in the Delta House still got As - that's why I've always appreciated so much what Major did to Penn State on that broken play.
Someone wearing a gold and blue jersey had finally put one over on Paterno's team.
As retired ESPN announcer and silent Mountaineer supporter Mike Patrick once told me, "For all of the long-suffering WVU fans watching that game, (that Harris play) took 25 years of frustration away."
Among the legion of long-suffering West Virginians was secondary coach Steve Dunlap, whose playing career at WVU included a 62-14 loss to Penn State in 1973, a 21-12 setback in 1974 and a 39-0 defeat in 1975.
To this day, he's still pissed at safety Rich Rodriguez for filling the wrong gap on D.J. Dozier's long touchdown run in West Virginia's landmark 17-14 victory over Penn State in 1984. Had Rich Rod gone to the right hole, the final score would have been 17-7 instead.
So naturally, Dunlap, sitting in the press box, watched with glee as Harris and his teammates ran up and down the field on Jerry Sandusky's vaunted Penn State defense like a hot knife through butter. All of the coaches were still in the booth when Nehlen waved the white flag and called a draw play for Undra Johnson to run out the clock and end the half.
Up 34-8 at the time, Nehlen was more than content to go into the locker room with a 26-point lead, but Sandusky, for some reason, called an all-out blitz and that stupid draw play the Mountaineer fans used to include in their Don Nehlen Up-The-Middle-Meters turned into a 55-yard touchdown run.
"I couldn't believe it," Nehlen admitted years later. "I'm watching all of these guys leaving their area where Undra is going thinking, 'Oh boy, this is going to be pretty good!'"
Undra was so fast that he beat the game clock by three seconds, requiring West Virginia to squib-kick the ball to end the first half before the players could run to the locker room like a pack of wild dogs to begin planning their Sunnyside incursions for later that night.Dunlap purposely held the press box elevator for Sandusky so he could pat him on the back and console him a little bit, "Hang in there, Jerry, you'll be alright," he told him.
"Now that was fun," Dunlap chuckled.
It was fun because Major Harris made the games fun for all of us.
Years later, Harris admitted those four years at West Virginia from 1986-89 were the best four years of his life, and yes, he regrets not spending a fifth one at WVU in 1990 as well.
"Once you get to college, I think that's why a lot of people say college was the best times of their lives because it's an experience that you'll never get again," Harris once said. "I will say this, if I had to go back in any time in my life, I'd want to go back to that time I spent in college at West Virginia."
If Uncle Rico's Time Machine Module actually worked, we'd all set the dial back to 1988, strap that electrical contraption around our waists and try and relive the greatest football season in Mountaineer history.
Congratulations, Major, on getting your No. 9 officially retired earlier today. You deserve it!
And, all of these years later, thanks again for finally putting one on those old Nittanys!
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