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Rich Rodriguez did not leave West Virginia on the best terms when he defected to Michigan in 2008, but that didn’t stop the school from inviting him back for another ride more than 15 years later. His introductory press conference was briefly derailed by a heckler who disrupted the affair, but he had a pretty solid comeback locked and loaded.
In 2001, Rich Rodriguez was tapped to replace the legendary Don Nehlen as the head football coach at West Virginia.
He knew he had some big shoes to fill when he accepted the job, and while it took him a season to find his footing, he quickly returned the Mountaineers to their former glory during a run where WVU secured four Big East titles in five seasons and won 11 games during his last three years at the helm.
That last statistic does need a bit of an asterisk, as the team was 10-2 and gearing up for the Fiesta Bowl midway through December in 2007 when Rodriguez announced he’d agreed to become the next head coach at the University of Michigan following the end of his seventh season in Morgantown.
Rodriguez declined to stick around for the bowl game the Mountaineers were forced to settle for after blowing the chance to play for a national championship with a stunning upset at the hands of Pitt just a couple of weeks before he officially resigned, and the fact that the program hasn’t been able to reach the heights he brought it to since his departure only deepened the resentment of the many fans who understandably held a grudge against him.
They say time heals all wounds, and that was largely the case based on the reception Rodriguez got on Friday at the introductory press conference the school held inside WVU Coliseum, which attracted thousands of fans and served as the location for a remote installment of The Pat McAfee Show.
The skipper commonly referred to as “Rich Rod” got a very warm welcome from the vast majority of attendees with the exception of a heckler who temporarily disrupted the proceedings and reportedly yelled “Go back to Michigan!” before he was escorted out of the event.
There was a heckler at the Rich Rodriguez press conference for WVU. He did not get a warm response pic.twitter.com/rmom5m9KrD
— Inside The Dome (@inside_the_dome) December 13, 2024
Rodriguez didn’t miss a beat, as he quipped”Any other Pitt fans can leave the building” before the press conference continued.
Well played, Rich. Well played.