(Citynet Statewide Sportsline interview with John Pennington)
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — A Rasheed Marshall pump fake and toss to the corner of the north end zone at Milan Puskar Stadium allowed John Pennington to create an enduring memory in the history of the ‘Backyard Brawl’.
In the final minute of the first half in West Virginia’s 2003 matchup against Pittsburgh, Pennington laid out to reel in a 28-yard scoring strike, tying the score at 24. WVU went on to win 52-31 and the George Washington High School grad produced the play of a lifetime.
“I love getting asked about it,” Pennington said. “It is a great memory. It was a great night to be a Mountaineer. It was a great night for me but Quincy (Wilson) rushed for over two hundred yards and it was a great, entertaining game. And we hammered Pitt in the second half. I love reliving that memory.”
Fast forward seventeen years and Pennington remains in the game. He is entering his fourth season as the head coach at West Virginia State University. His coaching career began with a three-year stint at West Virginia Wesleyan, thanks in part to an assist from one of his college coaches.
“I call it the quarter-life crisis. My whole life I was an athlete and a football player and after college my whole identity was gone. I really had no idea what I was doing. I was just trying to figure out life and what to do as an adult. I was helping out Coach (Steve) Edwards at GW just trying to pass the time and I bumped into (former WVU assistant) Herb Hand. He said, ‘Hey, do you want to coach and get a masters degree?’ I said, ‘Yeah’. He called up (Wesleyan head coach) Bill Struble right on the spot and said, ‘Alright, I got you a job’.”
Pennington later coached at WVU-Tech (2008-2009) and then came to WV State to coach the offensive line and special teams units in 2010. He spent the next four seasons working in a variety of roles within the Concord football program. In 2015, he returned to Institute as the Yellow Jackets’ offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach. Two years later, he was promoted to head coach.
In 2017, Pennington led State to their first winning season in a decade (6-5). Another six-win season followed in 2018. Last fall, the Jackets were 7-3 against Division II competition, and played for the Mountain East Conference championship on the final week of the season, falling to Notre Dame College.
“It was just a gradual improvement of our culture. I am very intentional about our organizational culture. That is really what we are building. In order for us to be a championship caliber football team, we have to build an elite culture. It takes time to do those things.
“In the third year, those roots were starting to take hold. In the fourth and fifth year is when the culture really takes over.”
Like many college football programs across the country, the Yellow Jackets were unable to get any spring practices in prior to the COVID-19 pandemic shutting down college campuses. Pennington however was impressed with early returns from the team’s offseason workouts during the winter.
“We did get to see some guys that moved positions and guys that stepped into new roles. We at least got to see them do some things with a football. We didn’t get to do any practice or run any plays but that stuff is a little bit overrated. I think the team had the best offseason I have seen here.”
Pennington is not the only George Washington High School graduate climbing the coaching ladder. Shawn Clark was promoted to head coach at Appalachian State during the offseason.
“It turns out we have the same great-great-grandmother. Jokingly when I talk with him, I just call him ‘cuz’.
Pennington has a pair of former college teammates on his coaching staff at WVSU. Weir High School graduate Quincy Wilson is the running backs coach. Robert C. Byrd High School graduate George Shehl is the defensive coordinator and defensive backs coach.
“Quincy might be one of the strongest people on our team. But all three of us are still in great shape. We run and we work out. I know Quincy can still probably squat five hundred pounds and I know he can bench over three hundred pounds. Quincy is football-ready.”
Despite having narrow windows of ‘free time’ during the day, Pennington recently published the book, ‘Small Wins = Big Gains’. It was a project nearly two years in the making.
“At four or five in the morning I would spend thirty minutes a day working on the book. Twenty months later the book is complete and published. That’s what we try to do with the team, that’s what I try to do with myself is set a big goal and then I try to focus on the daily habits I need to get to that goal.”
Remembering WV State legend Cal Bailey
Former WV State baseball coach Cal Bailey passed away on Sunday at age 77. Bailey led the Yellow Jacket program to 1,063 wins from 1978-2014. Pennington grew up attending Bailey’s camps in Institute.
“I went to West Virginia State baseball camp probably from the time I was seven years old through high school and he always just called me ‘lefty’.
“When I got the head coaching job at West Virginia State he called me and we talked on the phone for about an hour. He was giving me advice on what to do and how to succeed at State and how to succeed as a coach, a husband and a father. I will never forget that conversation.”