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Rich Rodriguez explains banning TikTok dances from West Virginia locker room
By Paul Harvey
Published:
Rich Rodriguez is already among the winningest coaches in West Virginia history. Now, he’s back trying to turn around the Mountaineers once again, and the head is apparently putting his foot down on social media usage.
With West Virginia hitting the field for spring practices, Rodriguez confirmed he does not have an outright ban on social media in the program. However, he is putting a stop to TikTok dances inside the locker room.
As for his reasoning? Rodriguez pointed to wanting his players to focus on the team over individualism. He also wants the program to focus on toughness, something he believes the social media craze takes away from.
“They’re going to be on (social media), so I’m not banning them from it. I’m just banning them from dancing on it. It’s like look, we try to have a hard edge and whatever and you’re in there in your tights dancing on TikTok. It ain’t quite the image of our program that I want,” explained Rodriguez.
“… But I told our team, everything today is about trying to make everybody individual, it’s all about the individual. Football is one of the last things that’s got to be more about the tea than the individual, and so I just banned dancing on TikTok, I guess I did that.”
Rodriguez didn’t stop there, making it clear he’s not concerned what the players decide to do or partake in when they eventually leave the program. But, for now, he wants the entire focus on winning games.
“I’m allowed to do that, I guess I can have rules now. 20 years from now, they want to be sitting in their pajamas in their basement eating Cheetos and watching TikTok or whatever the hell, they can go at it. Smoking cannabis, or whatever, knock yourself out,” Rodriguez said to laughs in the room. “I hope their focus can be on winning football games. Let’s win the football game not worry about winning the TikTok.”
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Rodriguez went 60-26 overall during his first stint with the program and currently ranks 3rd on West Virginia’s all-time wins list. He has since bounced around at Michigan, Arizona and Jacksonville State but is back in Morgantown to try and rejuvenate a program that 2 seasons with 10+ wins since he departed in 2007.
Paul Harvey lives in Atlanta and covers SEC football.
