Like father, so does son.
Cole Pennington, the son of former Jets quarterback Chad Pennington, scored the first touchdown of his collegiate career in Marshall University's dominant 45-3 win over Stony Brook University on Saturday in the season opener for both teams in Huntington, West Virginia.
The redshirt sophomore, the team's third-string quarterback, delivered a 16-yard touchdown pass to Bralon Brown late in the fourth quarter of the Thundering Herd's big win.
Cole recorded four hits in five at-bats in 80 appearances during his short time on the mound.
Transfer quarterbacks Stone Earl and Braylon Braxton each threw two touchdown passes for Marshall University.
Cole is following in his father's great footsteps at Marshall.
Chad led Marshall to the 1995 NCAA Division I-AA Football Championship Game, but lost 22-20 to Montana.
The following year, Pennington redshirted. Eric KresserA transfer from Florida, he led Marshall to the I-AA championship game again in 1996, winning that game.
Pennington Sr., who also threw passes to star receiver Randy Moss during the star's two stellar years at the school, returned as Marshall's starting quarterback from 1997-99 and had such an impressive record that he was inducted into the school's Hall of Fame along with Moss.
Pennington's storied career at Marshall University culminated in 1999 when he went a perfect 13-0 record and earned a program-best national ranking of No. 10 after that stellar season.
The former Jets quarterback, who also played for the Dolphins during his 11-year NFL career, was a three-time All-Mid-American Conference quarterback and led Marshall to conference titles in 1997, '98 and '99.
He finished his Marshall career completing 1,026 of 1,619 passes for 13,423 yards, 115 touchdowns and just 45 interceptions.
As Jets fans know, Pennington led Gang Green to three playoff appearances during eight seasons in New York, including a division title in 2002.
However, since his son is still trying to make a name for himself at Marshall University, we won’t go into any more detail about his NFL accomplishments.
