Friends of Coal Bowl

The Friends of Coal Bowl is an annual college football game played between the West Virginia University Mountaineers and the Marshall University Thundering Herd. The game is sponsored by the Friends of Coal, a coal industry trade group. Planned to be a seven year series, the "Friends of Coal Bowl" was organized by the West Virginia Coal Association at the urging of West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin.

The first game of the series was played in Morgantown, West Virginia at Mountaineer Field on September 2, 2006 and was won by the Mountaineers 42-10. The location for the game will alternate every year between Morgantown and Huntington, West Virginia where Marshall plays at Joan C. Edwards Stadium.

The trophy awarded to the winning team is called the "Governor's Cup". It will be presented by the West Virginia Governor and housed at the university which wins the annual matchup. Made completely in West Virginia, the trophy is made of a carbon base, a glass pedestal, and football-shaped piece of coal enclosed in glass. It was designed by Rick Mogielski.

History

Despite both teams being from the state of West Virginia, hard feelings and politics kept the teams from playing for the most part. Teams from West Virginia University and Marshall University had only played 5 previous times before the beginning of this series in 2006.

The '97 match-up is often thought of as the start of "hard feelings" between the two schools. When Marshall moved to Division 1A in 1997 their first game was against WVU. WVU jumped out to a 28-3 lead in the first half. Marshall led that game 31-28 going to the fourth quarter with Randy Moss leading the show. However, two touchdowns in the final quarter gave WVU the victory. At that point, bad blood arose between the two administrations WVU claims Marshall backed out of 3 future games. Marshall claims they were never scheduled. The schools couldn't come to an agreement to play again. Former Marshall head coach Bob Pruett tried to get the WVU Administration to agree to a series, but WVU stood by their stance of wanting 3 out of 4 games to be played in Morgantown, while Marshall demanded 1 out of every 3 be played in Huntington. West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin got the schools together and hashed out the current format which includes four games in Morgantown, two in Huntington, and the remaining game will be decided by who wins two out of the first three games. The fair settlement finally got the only two Division 1A schools in the state playing together.

West Virginia won the first match-up of the new series 42-10 in 2006, and the next one in Huntington 48-23 in 2007. West Virginia defeated Marshall in 2008, 27-3, after losing two consecutive games to begin the season 1-2. WVU will host Marshall again in 2009.

Game results

"West Virginia victories are shaded blue. Marshall victories shaded in green."

External links

* [http://www.friendsofcoal.org/site/foc_bowl.html Friends of Coal Bowl official site]
* [http://www.msnsportsnet.com West Virginia University official athletics site]
* [http://herdzone.cstv.com Marshall University official athletics site]
* [http://wvustats.com/football/opp.php?team_id=308&opp_id=152 Marshall vs. West Virginia series history]