West Virginia’s plan to retire Pat White’s No. 5 comes with one unusual wrinkle: Jaden Bray will still wear it in 2026.
The Mountaineers are set to honor White on Sept. 5, 2026, the day of their season opener against Coastal Carolina. That ceremony will be part of a “White Out,” and it will mark the unofficial retirement of the jersey before the number is finally removed from circulation.
There’s a reason for the delay. Bray, a senior wide receiver, gets one last season in No. 5 before it’s taken away for good. Rich Rodriguez said White himself pushed for the wait so Bray could finish his career without being forced into a number change.
“This is how Pat is. Once we told him we were going to retire his number, he said, ‘Let’s wait one year so Jaden can wear it for his senior year,’ and that’s the kind of guy Pat is," he told college football analyst A.P. Steadham.
Bray said at Big 12 Media Day that he understands what the number means and plans to carry it with that in mind.
“This year, I get to wear the five for the last time. So, I’m going to do all I can to honor him all the past number fives," Bray told reporters at Big 12 Media Day.
He also described the moment he found out the jersey was being retired.
“It was such a surreal moment," Bray said when he learned of the news. "We were all in the team room, and Pat McAfee was there, and they played the screen and were like ‘We’re retiring No.5,’ and I just started clapping because I was so happy for him. I’ve never told him this, but he’s just been a major part of me and my journey, just watching him and how he attacks every day.”
Bray’s path at West Virginia has been interrupted by injury. He was supposed to be one of the team’s top passing-game options in 2024 and was expected to lead the receiver group in 2025, but a foot injury ended both seasons early.
Now he gets one final college run, and it comes with the added weight of being the last Mountaineer to wear White’s number.
Before arriving in Morgantown, Bray spent his first three seasons at Oklahoma State, where he caught 48 passes for 686 yards and four touchdowns. One of those scores came against West Virginia in Morgantown in 2023.
In Other News...
BYU Just Landed In The Middle Of A Wild Big 12 Debate
A recent On3 Coaches Poll offered a pretty clear snapshot of how wide open the Big 12 feels heading into the season, and BYU came out as the choice most coaches trusted to win the conference. That alone says plenty about the leagues balance of power, especially with Texas Tech, Utah, Houston, Arizona and Iowa State also drawing support in a vote that seemed to spread confidence around rather than concentrate it.
For West Virginia fans, the broader takeaway is familiar: there is no consensus answer in this league, only a cluster of teams with enough talent and intrigue to keep the conversation moving. The poll underscored just how unpredictable the Big 12 can be from year to year, with coaches clearly seeing a conference where the title race could tilt in several directions before it ever reaches the finish line. [Read more 🡒]
Rich Rod Just Said What Frustrated WVU Fans Have Wanted Heard
West Virginias place in the Big 12 has long come with a built-in headache: the travel, the geography and the sense that the Mountaineers are often fighting uphill just to keep old regional ties alive. At Big 12 Media Day, Rich Rodriguez leaned into that frustration and put a cleaner frame around what many WVU fans have been saying for years, pushing for a future realignment built around regional groupings that would make the league feel a little more like home.
Rodriguez also floated a broader fix for the sports money problem, arguing that Power Four schools should pool TV revenue into one large package and spread it more evenly. The idea fits the same theme as the regional reset, but it is still more vision than reality, with the current conference and media setup unlikely to change quickly and the bigger college football revenue model still very much an open question. [Read more 🡒]