Overview
- The Mountaineers ceremonially retired Pat White’s No. 5 on Saturday to recognize a college career that included a 35-8 record, 6,049 passing yards, 4,480 rushing yards and 103 total touchdowns.
- Reports note White won four bowl games in four seasons, including signature wins over Georgia in the Sugar Bowl and Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl that helped cement his status in Morgantown.
- White was a second-round pick (No. 44 overall) by the Miami Dolphins in 2009 and appeared in 13 games as a rookie before a January 2010 concussion that left him unconscious effectively ended his NFL regular-season play.
- Contemporaries and analysts praised his college play—Devin McCourty called him “unstoppable” after facing him multiple times—and coverage stresses the retirement is symbolic recognition of those accomplishments.
- The honor joins a very small set of retired Mountaineers numbers and renews discussion that White generated major value for the program at a time when players did not benefit from name-image-likeness compensation.