The West Virginia football program closed the spring with Gold-Blue Showcase held inside Mountaineer Field Saturday afternoon.
Prior to the event, sophomore running back Clay Ash was awarded with the 2025 Tommy Nickolich Memorial Award which recognizes the effort of a walk-on in the program.
Three Mountaineers were named the Warriors of Winter for their efforts in the weight room in senior linebacker Reid Carrico, senior offensive lineman Kimo Makane’ole and senior safety Keke Tarnue.
The event began with a field goal kicking competition featuring all of the kickers on the roster including Ethan Head, RJ Kocan and Nate Flower booting the ball from various depths. Each of the kickers connected to move the ball back to 58-yards before moving onto the scrimmage.
During that portion, players rotated in and out of the various units including some on the same drives even at the quarterback spot.
On the first possession of an abbreviated scrimmage, Nicco Marchiol connected on a deep ball to Cam Vaughn but the drive would stall and end in a Head field goal from 38-yards out. Jaylen Henderson then took control of the second series and the drive would stall at midfield.
Max Brown would take the reins at quarterback on the third series, who unlike the first two quarterbacks was not sporting a black jersey and could be contacted. Brown was able to guide the offense for a touchdown using his legs and some efficient passing.
Henderson then took over the next series and completed 3-5 passes on his next drive aided by a facemask penalty to set the offense up deep in the defense’s territory. And from there, Tye Edwards would cap off the drive with a two-yard touchdown run.
Freshman Scotty Fox was then given a series and moved the ball deep into the defense’s territory with a nice mix of runs and timely passing but the drive stalled on fourth down.
Redshirt junior Scott Kean then got his turn to lead the offense but would go three and out, before Abe Fenwick had an opportunity to serve as quarterback and moved the offense to midfield before stalling.
Brown would then take over as the signal caller once again and completed a pass to Vaughn to move inside the 20-yard line. From there Brown would use his legs to move the ball inside the five before a penalty moved the ball back and Diore Hubbard would score from 10-yard outs.
Henderson took over at quarterback after that and attempted to throw the ball down the middle of the field to Cyrus Traugh but the ball was picked off by Jason Chambers.
Marchiol got his second series after that and after completing a tight throw to Jarel Williams it was Hubbard again who finished the drive off with a nice run for a touchdown. Brown then was overtop the next series and completed a nice throw to TJ Johnson to set the ball up at the one-yard line where Trae'von Dunbar would finish it off.
The Mountaineers also rotated multiple quarterbacks within several different drives playing multiple options.
After that Rich Rodriguez was in the stands and asked fans to call two-point plays in the stands from a chart and elicited reaction from the people in the stands on the calls.
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