By Bob Hertzel
MORGANTOWN — The loudspeakers at North Florida University, where the West Virginia Mountaineers were going through their final real practice for the New Year’s Day Gator Bowl meeting with Bobby Bowden and his Florida State football team on Wednesday, were loud enough to be heard all the way down Interstate-10 in Tallahassee and what they were playing was music to any Seminole fans ears.
WVU players were being prepared for what is expected to a madhouse with the volume cranked up on the Seminole war chant. All that was missing was Florida State’s tomahawk chop, which will come 70,000 or so strong at the game.
Everyone knows this will be a celebration of Bobby Bowden, with West Virginia’s presence a necessary evil as the man needs someone to play in his final game after 388 victories in a career that took him from Samford College through West Virginia to the College Football Hall of Fame.
Coach Bill Stewart accepts the situation as it is and knows that all the emotion is going to be on FSU’s side and that countering it is like beating your head against a stone wall.
“You don’t [counter it],” Stewart before the terribly irritating and seemingly endless Seminole war chant began pouring out of the sound system. “They may come out on the field with 300 of his former players. Whatever, he’s earned it. All I know is that volumewise, every West Virginia fan will match it. I tell my team, it’s going to be emotional, but we’ve been in tough stadiums before.”
The thing is, West Virginia has playing on its team a great number of players from Florida, key players who once rooted for Florida state.
Quarterback Jarrett Brown is one of them.
So, too, is the man who may be the most important Mountaineer on the defensive side of the football — J.T. Thomas.
No one really knows what J.T. stands for in his name, or if it does, but anyone who has followed his career would believe it if you told them that it stands for “Jarring Tackles”, for no one wearing the old gold and blue on New Year’s Day has put more teeth rattling hits on ball carriers and receivers over the past couple of season that Thomas.
The son of a former WVU player of the same name, Thomas attended high school in Florida and admits he once was smitten with the Seminoles, but that was then and this is now.
“My dad opened my eyes to West Virginia,” he said. “When it came down to it, West Virginia was the best school to offer me a scholarship.”
Being from Florida has a lot of meaning to the kids who come north to West Virginia. They hang together, have similar interests, similar backgrounds, often even similar recruiting experiences.
But they also have something else in common, according to Thomas.
“The guys from Florida have pride. We want to show them. I gave up being a Florida State fan but it is nice to get a chance to play against Coach Bowden in his last game,” Thomas said.
While this is the final game for Floridian Jarrett Brown, the quarterback, at West Virginia andthere is some question about whether this is the final game for Floridians Noel Devine, the running back, and slot receiver Jock Sanders, Thomas put to rest any thoughts that he may be leaving for the NFL early.
“Not at all,” Thomas answered when asked if he ever thinks about leaving after this year. “I don’t think I’m ready. All I’m thinking about right now is beating Florida State.”
And he will play a huge part in it out of his linebacker spot because he has exactly the right equipment necessary to match up with the Seminoles.
“He has the same speed and athleticism we see in the Florida State athletes,” safety Sidney Glover said. “He has that and he plays with a chip on his shoulder.”
And one other thing. He’s used to hearing the Seminole war chant.
E-mail Bob Hertzel at bhertzel@hotmail.com
