MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Detroit running back Martell Pettaway, one of the top prospects in Michigan for the class of 2016, committed to West Virginia on Tuesday.
Rivals, which rates Pettaway a three-star prospect and the No. 12 player in the state, spoke with the recruit and learned of his commitment shortly before he tweeted it.
ESPN rates Pettaway a four-star recruit and, for a spell during January, listed him as the No. 1 overall player in Michigan. It now ranks him the state’s ninth-best prospect.
A powerfully built 5-foot-9, 202-pounder with 4.6 speed, Pettaway was only a sophomore when Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio extended ascholarship. He has fielded additional offers from Iowa, Illinois, Northwestern, Vanderbilt, Cincinnati and Western Michigan.
“I saw Pettaway in person at the Rivals camp in Cleveland and he impressed,” said Keenan Cummings of the Rivals website WVSports.com. “Great combo of size and speed and catches ball well.
“West Virginia was the first school outside the Midwest region to offer Pettaway. And the bond between him and the school only continued to grow over the course of the last couple months.”
West Virginia running backs coach JaJaun Seider, who typically makes his recruiting mark in south Florida, took the lead in landing Pettaway.
Got a new toy to play with. Big body sitting on Chrome. #WVU
— JaJuan Seider (@coachseider) June 23, 2015
The nation’s 21st-rated running back according to Rivals, Pettaway posted back-to-back 1,300-yard rushing seasons at South Lake (Mich.) High before transferring to Martin Luther King this spring. There’s painful yet inspirational history resurfacing at MLK, where Pettaway will don the No. 32 jersey worn by his older brother Devinne, who collapsed in the school gym and died from cardiomyopathy in April 2008. The tragic passing occurred just a few months after Devinne led MLK to its first football state championship.
“First arriving at King High School was pretty rough,” Martell told MLive.com in May. “Understanding that it’s the place that my brother passed, I just walk around the school everyday with a chip on my shoulder knowing that he walked the halls and gave the school a championship.”
The last Michigan high school player to sign with the Mountaineers was Detroit safety Derek Knight in 2007, though WVU recently landed two University of Michigan transfers, offensive lineman Kyle Bosch and linebacker/fullback Michael Ferns.
In a West Virginia 2016 class now 13 members deep, Pettaway became the first running back pledge. The Mountaineers could be in search for at least two more running backs from a group of three-star prospects headed by Kennedy McKoy of Lexington, N.C., Tyliek Raynor of Philadelphia and Deon McIntosh of Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
Check out Pettaway’s junior highlights: