HUNTINGTON, W.Va.—Rakeem Cato has rewritten Marshall’s record books. He now holds nearly every Thundering Herd passing record, surpassing Marshall legends Chad Pennington and Bryon Leftwich. But there was always one thing that greats such as Chad Pennington and Bryon Leftwich, had that Cato didn’t.
A ring.
That is until Saturday.
“That’s been my main goal since I walked on campus. I wanted to come here, start the tradition over again and win a championship. We finally got one today,” said Cato after Marshall’s 26-23 win over Louisiana Tech.
Cato threw for 308 yards and two touchdowns, extending his record to 45 consecutive games with a touchdown pass. The only quarterback in NCAA history with a longer streak is Mike Reilly (2005-08) of Central Washington. He threw a touchdown pass in 46 straight games, a Division II record.
Even the way Cato won his first championship was similar to Chad Pennington in 1999. Pennington orchestrated a comeback win over Western Michigan and needed a near perfect final drive before finding Eric Pinkerton in the endzone for the game-winning touchdown.
Cato with 5:01 to play and no timeouts, did the same thing on Saturday. Cato was nearly perfect when his team needed him to be. Cato was 5-for-6 on the game-winning drive and even had to improvise on the championship clinching touchdown pass.
“We had a play drawn up and the defense figured it out and stopped it,” explained Deon-Tay McManus who caught the game-winning toss. “But I didn’t give up on the lay, tried to keep it alive and Cato found me for the touchdown.”
Cato, a four-year starter, cemented his place in Marshall football history with the win on Saturday.
“I told him after the game, you know what? You have all these records but what was not on his resume was a championship. Now with him winning that championship, you can talk about him with the same breath as you do Chad [Pennington] and Byron [Leftwich] because they did that and they got that done here,” said coach Doc Holliday.
“Now he’s got that done. That kid has mean so much to this program. He will be the quarterback who got it back where it belongs and where it needs to be. I told him after the game, if there was one person I wanted the ball in there hand, guess what? That is you and you found a way to get it done.”