West Virginia University football seniors, quarterback Jarret Doege, safety Sean Mahone and kicker Evan Staley, were named to the Wuerffel Trophy Award Watch List as announced by the organization.
The Wuerffel Trophy, known as "College Football's Premier Award for Community Service," is presented each February in Fort Walton Beach, Florida. Named after 1996 Heisman Trophy winning quarterback from the University of Florida, Danny Wuerffel, the Wuerffel Trophy exists to honor college football players who serve others, celebrate their positive impact on society and inspire greater service in the world.
All three are involved in team community service initiatives, and Mahone and Addae are WVU football accountability teams leaders. Activities that these players and their teammates could be involved in include visiting their friends at WVU Medicine Children's on a regular basis and serving as mentors, assisting the Mountaineer Day of Play to encourage an active and healthy lifestyle for children, reading at schools, community cleanup days, building and repairing houses for people in the community and serving as a Big Brothers just to name a few of their activities.
Doege, a 2020 All-Big 12 Second Team selection by PFF College and a fourth-team honoree by Phil Steele's Magazine, started all 10 games last year and completed 239-of-374 passes for 2,587 yards and 14 touchdowns with only four interceptions. He threw for 300 or more yards in four games and completed multiple touchdowns in four games.
Mahone, a 2020 CoSIDA Academic All-American Second Team member and four-time Academic All-Big 12 First Team honoree, started 12 games at Cat Safety in 2019 and 2020. Mahone, an All-Big 12 Conference second team selection by PFF College, started all 10 games at safety for WVU in 2020. The four-time Academic All-Big 12 selection was the Mountaineers fifth-leading tackler with 54 stops, including 34 solo tackles and two tackles for loss. He also had four pass breakups, an interception and a fumble recovery. Mahone led WVU in tackles as a junior with 80 stops, including two sacks, five tackles for loss, a forced fumble, an interception and a pass breakup.
Staley, a four-time Academic All-Big 12 First Team honoree, is a three-year starting kicker for the Mountaineers, handling kickoffs, extra points and field goals. In 2020, he kicked for six games until he sustained a season-ending knee injury against Kansas State. He connected on 6-of-9 field goals with a long of 45 yards and had 24 kickoffs, averaging 60.3 yards per kickoff. He was 2-of-2 at Oklahoma State and at Texas Tech and had a season-long field goal (45) at Texas Tech.
Nominations for the Wuerffel Trophy are made by the respective universities' sports information departments and will close on Oct. 15. An up to date list of nominees can be found at www.wuerffeltrophy.org beginning on Aug. 1. Semifinalists for the award will be announced on November 2 and finalists will be announced on Nov. 22.
The formal announcement of the 2021 recipient will be made on Dec. 9 and the presentation of the 2021 Wuerffel Trophy will occur in Feb. 2022 in Fort Walton Beach.
Past recipients of the award are: Rudy Niswanger - Louisiana State University - 2005; Joel Penton - Ohio State University - 2006; Paul Smith - University of Tulsa - 2008; Tim Tebow - University of Florida - 2008; Tim Hiller - Western Michigan University - 2009; Sam Acho - University of Texas - 2010; Barrett Jones - University of Alabama - 2011; Matt Barkley - University of Southern California - 2012; Gabe Ikard - University of Oklahoma - 2013; Deterrian Shackelford - University of Mississippi - 2014; Ty Darlington - University of Oklahoma - 2015; Trevor Knight - Texas A&M University - 2016; Courtney Love - University of Kentucky; 2017; Drue Tranquill - University of Notre Dame; 2018; Jon Wassink - Western Michigan University - 2019; Teton Saltes - University of New Mexico - 2020.