EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. – Rich Rodriguez glanced around the room inside Giants Stadium and couldn’t help but smile.

A few years ago, he was lucky to have two reporters at his table for Big East Media Day. Even writers from West Virginia avoided Rodriguez. They flocked to Miami coach Larry Coker and Virginia Tech coach Frank Beamer. Rodriguez was often an afterthought.

But as he glanced around the room in 2004 he was the center of attention. It was well deserved.

Rodriguez inherited a West Virginia team that, as recently as 1993, came within a win of a national title. But soon after, the Mountaineers were marred by inconsistency. Rodriguez went just 3-8 in his first season in 2001. Since then he’s catapulted West Virginia back onto the national scene.

He’s led the Mountaineers to back-to-back winning seasons, and last year shared the Big East title with Miami. The Mountaineers are ranked No. 10 in this year’s preseason Top 25.

It appears Rodriguez has found the right method to rebuilding a program – something Syracuse is trying to do after failing to reach a bowl game in back-to-back seasons for the first time in the Paul Pasqualoni era.

‘The greatest satisfaction was last year to get a share of the title,’ Rodriguez said. ‘Now we have to get to the point where we have success every year.’

This year, the Mountaineers are the preseason favorite in a depleted Big East. A Bowl Championship Series bowl game seems like a reality being that they’re the only Big East team in the Top 25.

Rodriguez remembers consistently losing recruits to schools like Tech and Miami. Now, the top-flight recruits are a little more interested in coming to Morgantown, W.Va.

‘If they got recruits like me,’ senior linebacker Adam Lehnortt joked, ‘you know they could get any recruits.’

But it’s been far from easy to rebuild. Rodriguez remembers his miserable first year in 2001. He replaced legendary Mountaineers coach Don Nehlen. It was Rodriguez’s first I-A head coaching job. People wrote him off after the 3-8 finish, the program’s worst mark since a 2-9 finish in 1978.

‘It was the longest year of coaching in my life,’ Rodriguez said. ‘A lot of people say it’s harder to stay at the top. Well, they’ve never been at the bottom.’Recruiting has improved the program, but Rodriguez credits lots of national television exposure to his program’s turnaround as well. The Mountaineers have a history of playing several midweek games each year.

Last season, West Virginia narrowly missed beating Miami in a Thursday night game. Rodriguez said several recruits watched the game on ESPN and were impressed with how the Mountaineers nearly defeated one of the nation’s top programs. A few weeks later, West Virginia hammered Virginia Tech, 28-7, on an ESPN Thursday night telecast.

‘We’ve been able to get into a lot of doors and get into a lot of conversations because of the games,’ Rodriguez said. ‘Recruits will say, ‘Oh yeah, I saw you on TV against Miami,’ or ‘Oh yeah, I saw you on TV against Virginia Tech.’ ‘

This season, West Virginia has three midweek games – on Oct. 13 at Connecticut, Oct. 21 at home against Syracuse and on Nov. 25 at Pittsburgh. ESPN will televise all three contests.

Last season, Syracuse didn’t play a single midweek game. Three of its games were shown on national TV, but SU lost two of them. This season, the Orange gets two shots in front of a national audience, including the West Virginia game. More games could be added to the national slate.

SU’s recruiting has been criticized in recent years. It remains to be seen whether the added exposure will help.

‘People have a tendency to panic when a program has a couple of down years,’ Rodriguez said. ‘Programs just have to stick with what they know.’

Published on September 1, 2004 at 12:00 pm