West Virginia head coach Rich Rodriguez feels good about the quarterback room.
So much so that the head coach has doubled down on his excitement about the position in his two most recent interview sessions with the local media.
“I think of all the positions we have, I mean everybody’s worried about the quarterback position and I know I said this the other day but I feel really good about the quarterback room,” Rodriguez said. “Real good. So we’ll be O.K. there.”
That is quite a vote of confidence for a room that has plenty of question marks with the departure of multi-year starter Garrett Greene and not a ton of on the field experience.
Redshirt junior Nicco Marchiol returns but has attempted just 122 passes over his three years, completing 71 of those for 742 yards and 8 touchdowns. But Marchiol had his most productive season this past year, completing 66-percent of his 56 passes for 434 yards and 5 of those scores.
When Greene was out with injury on the road against Arizona and Cincinnati, Marchiol engineered a pair of wins for the Mountaineers in his stead.
On top of Marchiol, West Virginia brought in two experienced transfers in Jaylen Henderson of Texas A&M and Max Brown from Charlotte. The pair have multiple years of experience at different locations with Henderson starting his career at Fresno State and Brown at Florida.
Henderson saw limited time at Fresno State appearing in five games but started the final four of the 2023 season for the Aggies. During that stretch he accounted for eight of the 14 team’s touchdowns over the final three games. He completed 53-of-78 for 715 yards and six passing touchdowns while also proving himself as a capable option with his legs.
Brown appeared in just five games in 2024 and completed 43-93 passes for 561 yards and 3 scores while rushing for 72 more. He also played in five more games during his time with the Gators where he threw for 192 yards and rushed for 37. Prior to that he was an accomplished quarterback at Lincoln Christian in Oklahoma, where he accounted for 4,416 passing yards and 68 touchdowns in two years.
The final two scholarship options in the room competing for the job are redshirt freshman Khalil Wilkins who drew praises from the former coaching staff for his development, although at the time it was said that patience was going to be needed.
True freshman Scotty Fox enrolled in January after a senior season where he racked up 3,076 total yards of offense. Those totals included 2,759 passing yards on a 64.0-percent completion rate with 34 touchdowns and 321 rushing yards with seven touchdowns.
The group will be coached by a combination of Rodriguez, his son Rhett and assistant quarterbacks coach Pat White. The first two on that list will play a role as a good cop/bad cop dynamic.
“So I think they get a little good cop, bad cop stuff with Rhett and I, but, you know, he's done a great job with them. And I really, I like our quarterback room from a conscientious standpoint. I mean, those guys really are eager,” Rodriguez said.
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