College coaches on Super Bowl hero James White: 'I knew we had something special'

Two games into his college career, former Wisconsin running back James White cost his team a touchdown with a first-quarter fumble during a 27-14 win over San Jose State in 2010.

White had taken a handoff from quarterback Scott Tolzien at the visitors’ 9-yard line — his 14th carry as a Badger and just his third in front of the home crowd at Camp Randall — and as he attempted to extend the ball across the goal line, a Spartans player knocked it loose and out of the end zone for a touchback.

The turnover was a devastating blow for White, at the time an undersized three-star recruit trying to prove his worth in a loaded Wisconsin backfield that featured Montee Ball and John Clay. As White sulked to the sideline following the play, then-Badgers coach Bret Bielema didn’t lose his cool with his unheralded freshman. Instead, he coached him up.

"I remember I came up to him,” Bielema recalled Tuesday in a phone interview with FOX Sports. “And I told him, ‘Remember this play the rest of your career. Never reach the ball into the end zone. Run the ball into the end zone.’”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYH38SdwLqM

More than six years later, it’s tough to say whether Bielema’s words still ring in White’s ears. But as White rammed his way across the goal line with the New England Patriots’ game-winning touchdown at Super Bowl LI, he certainly looked like a guy who had learned his lesson.

‘He kind of extended it, but he didn’t reach it, like some kids might naturally put it way out in front of him and get it knocked out,” said Bielema, now the head coach at Arkansas. “He did exactly what he was coached to do, and it’s not surprising to me.”

Nor is it surprising that White made such a massive impact on football’s biggest stage in the first place.

Prior to the Patriots’ stunning 34-28 win over the Atlanta Falcons in Houston, White, a 2014 fourth-rounder, served primarily as New England’s third-down back, a quality pass-catcher but not necessarily a vital cog in coach Bill Belichick’s machine. Yet he proved invaluable during the team’s 25-point second-half comeback, hauling in nine of his 14 catches for 55 of his 110 receiving yards.

“We’re sitting on the couch and I’m with my offensive line coach, T.J. Woods, who was with me at Wisconsin, and James is catching all these passes,” Oregon State coach Gary Andersen, White’s coach during his senior season at Wisconsin, told FOX Sports by phone. “So I look at him in the third quarter, and I’m like, ‘Shoot, T.J., why didn’t we throw James the ball more?’

“And (Woods) looked at me and kind of nodded his head, ‘Yeah, yeah,’ ” Andersen continued. “But then he looked back at me and said, ‘Well, maybe it’s because he was too busy rushing for more than 1,000 yards every year.’ ”

White accounted for a Super Bowl-record 20 points: a receiving touchdown, critical two-point conversion and two rushing touchdowns, including the overtime game-winner from two yards out.

“I was sitting there on the couch with my wife, and when he scored his first one she said, ‘Maybe he’ll be the MVP,’ and I said, ‘Babe, if the Patriots win it, (Tom) Brady’s going to be the MVP,’” Bielema said. “And then he got his second touchdown, and then the one at the end, I didn’t know what was going to happen, but I was still pretty sure it would be a minor miracle if he got it.

“But then when I saw him up on stage at the end of the game, I started getting emotional,” Bielema continued. “I saw him put his hands over his face and roll his head back while the other guys were talking — all I was doing was watching him — and all I could think about was when I called his dad after he got drafted by the Patriots, and he was like, ‘My son’s a Patriot! My son’s a Patriot!’

“He just kept saying that on the phone,” Bielema said, “and I just had one of those moments where I was like, ‘Wow, a kid I coached is going to be a Super Bowl MVP.’”

Brady, of course, went on to win the award, as expected. Regardless, Bielema said versatility was part of why he recruited White out of Florida prep powerhouse St. Thomas Aquinas.

“One of the things I learned early in life is you recruit your own problems, and I knew this: When I was recruiting James White, I wasn’t going to have any problems,” Bielema said. “His demeanor, his ability and the respect he had from his coaches in his locker room in high school were unparalleled, and they had a lot of great players on that team. And when I got him in my locker room, he didn’t have to say a lot to demand respect.”

That held true throughout White’s Wisconsin career, which saw him rush for 4,015 yards and 45 touchdowns, along with 670 receiving yards and three scores through the air.

“When I first got to know him, he was just a hard-working, tough kid,” said Andersen, who took over for Bielema in Dec. 2012. “Football meant a lot to him, his team meant a lot to him, and you were going to get the same work ethic every day out of him. And the best thing about James is that that hasn’t changed.”

According to Andersen, White’s humility has remained evident as a pro, even in the lead-up to Sunday’s game.

“Whenever the Patriots got (to Houston), I’m watching NFL Network and James goes walking by in the background and it looks like he has a hamburger in his hands,” Andersen said. “So I text him, ‘Hey, was that a burger in your hand?’ and he hits me right back, ‘Oh no, Coach, I didn’t think that was on live TV!’

“He’s just so James,” Andersen continued, “and it comes from his family.”

In fact, Bielema said White’s upbringing, as the son of a Miami-Dade County police officer father and a probation officer mother, played a huge role in his decision to bring him to Wisconsin.

“There was a game where the Miami-Dade police department played the Orlando police department, and when I came in on a home visit, it just so happened that the tape was out and the VCR was running, and a kickoff return by his dad against the Orlando police department happened to be queued up perfectly,” Bielema recalled. “And we walked in, and James couldn’t stop laughing because he knew his dad was wanting to show it off.

“Of course, (after the return) his dad proceeds to go over to the sidelines and sit for 15 minutes because he’s out of air,” Bielema continued. “But James knew exactly what his dad was doing, and just to see that relationship, I knew we had something special.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Xq4YRnOMqo

And it would appear that Belichick also has something special in White, who made the jump from relative unknown to Super Bowl hero in a matter of a couple hours in front of an audience of hundreds of millions. That being said, there is always the chance that White returns to the background by the time the 2017 season kicks off — such is Belichick’s M.O.

If that’s the case, White’s former coaches expect it to be a role he embraces with no questions asked.

“Trust me, James White is very, very capable of understanding that, No. 1, he needs to keep working and grinding, and that, No. 2, even when you do that in the NFL — or, quite frankly, in college, or in life — that doesn’t guarantee anything," Andersen said. "So he’s not going to take a back seat and say, ‘I’ve arrived,’ or, ‘I don’t need to work as hard,’ because it’s not in that kid’s makeup.”

“I guarantee you he understands that,” Bielema added. “And if he doesn’t he has a set of parents that’ll tell him that. He’s a very driven, very gifted young man who’s so humble, so appreciative of what he is. There’s not one person who will ever play with James White that’s going to say one negative thing about him, or who he is or what he stands for. He’s just that kind of kid.”

You can follow Sam Gardner on Twitter or email him at samgardnerfox@gmail.com.