MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Greenbrier West is enjoying their best start to a season since 2013 when the Cavaliers advanced to the Class A state championship game. At 5-1, GWHS enters the eighth week of the regular season ranked fifth in the SSAC ratings and sixth in the MetroNews power rankings.
The first head coach in program history has returned to lead Cavalier football. Toby Harris has injected new life into a team that is coming off back-to-back two-win seasons.
“They do like their football,” Harris said. “They have had four pretty tough years. The community is getting around us and we are getting good crowds. Everyone is excited.”
Harris graduated from the West Virginia Institute of Technology in 1966. When Greenbrier West High School was opened in 1968, Harris was selected to guide the GWHS football program. He posted a record of 65-35-1 in ten seasons as head coach, advancing to postseason play in 1976 and 1977. In the first six seasons, the Cavaliers played all of their ‘home’ games in Rainelle, which is about four miles from their campus in Charmco.
Harris returned to the program this summer and has seen immediate success. “I hadn’t been too far away from the football team. I had been watching them and these kids had tough years the last couple seasons. But you could see that there was some potential. They’re very good kids and hard working kids.”
Harris is also an accomplished wrestling coach. He launched the program at Greenbrier West and posted a 181-75-2 dual meet record in 23 seasons. His 1977 team finished as the state runner-up. Harris was inducted into the West Virginia State Chapter of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2006.
The Cavaliers feature a run-dominated offensive attack, throwing the ball on only fifteen percent of their snaps. Harris admits his offense has evolved over the years.
“I worked 38 years in education and then I retired. I went back to Oak Hill and coached for three years (2005-2007). During that time, I spent some time at WVU watching their offense and started spreading the ball out a little bit myself. This year, we are actually doing both. You will see us in the spread, you will see us sometimes back in the I-formation and running the ball right at you.”
“Everybody we play now seems to be using a spread offense, spreading the field and throwing it more. Back when I started we were pretty much fundamental football, playing two tight ends and running the football.”
The Cavalier offense is led by junior running back Noah Brown. In last Friday’s 34-10 win over Pocahontas County, Brown set the program’s single-game rushing record with a 324-yard performance. He has rushed for 1,078 yards and seventeen touchdowns.
“Noah is a good running back. He is about 6-foot-3, 220 pounds. He is starting to make some cuts. If we can get him out in space, he is tough to bring down.”
Greenbrier West’s offense is engineered by junior quarterback Kaiden Pack. He was a standout guard in the Cavaliers’ run to the state basketball tournament last winter. Pack has three touchdown passes and has rushed for three more scores.
“Kaiden is a real good athlete. He played as a split end on the single wing the last few years so we had to develop a quarterback. He just seems to be getting better every week. He has accepted what we are trying to do. We don’t think he is near what he is going to be.”
The Cavaliers seek their fourth consecutive victory Friday night at Richwood. A split of their final four games will likely propel the Cavaliers into the playoffs for the first time in five years.
“They are playing well on both sides of the ball as a team. They have great attitudes.”