When West Virginia University recently announced its football recruiting class, it was void of West Virginia natives.
That's not all that unusual, for the number of Division 1 football prospects annually produced in the Mountain State generally is less than a handful.
Yet, there's nothing that makes West Virginians swell with pride more than seeing one of their own do well in a Mountaineer uniform.
It's been amazing to witness the excitement level in Parkersburg since Josh Jenkins, Matt Lindamood, Cody Nutter and Michael Molinari have become key members of the Mountaineer football program.
Jenkins was the subject of the biggest recruiting battle in the history of the city as Jim Tressel, Charlie Weis, Bobby Bowden, Rich Rodriguez and finally Bill Stewart came to town seeking the services of the only athlete in Mountain State history to twice win the Hunt Award, given to the state's top lineman.
It was important for WVU to land Jenkins. Stewart knew that. Jenkins knew that.
And they managed to -in the words of Larry The Cable Guy -git 'r dun.
Now, we're about to repeat the same scenario.
Last year, during his junior season at George Washington High School, Ryan Switzer won the Kennedy Award -West Virginia's high school version of the Heisman Trophy -by nearly a unanimous vote of state sports writers.
WVU recently offered Switzer - the odds-on favorite to win his second Kennedy Award this fall - a football scholarship, which would make him the first Mountain State recruit in the Dana Holgorsen era.
Now that there are five teams in the Region 3, Section 1 Tournament, PHS and South have just one chance in four of playing each other in the initial game.
But that's what is going to happen in the upcoming girls basketball regional. When the pairings were released on Monday, South was seeded No. 2 and PHS was the No. 3 seed, meaning the Big Reds will meet the Patriots at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 22, at the Rod Oldham Athletic Center.
George Washington is the top seed and will be the home team for the other sectional semifinal, also set for 7 p.m. on the 22nd. GW?will meet the winner of a preliminary game to take place at 7 p.m. on Monday, Feb. 20, pitting No. 5 seed Ripley at No. 4 Capital.
The championship game will take place at 7 p.m. on Friday at the gymnasium of the highest remaining seed.
Thus, the loser of the South-PHS game will be eliminated, while the winner will advance to regional play even if it winds up losing the sectional championship game.
That's called high stakes.
Contact Dave Poe at dpoe@newsandsentinel.com
