MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — West Virginia University is ready to officially coronate junior accounting major Cade Kincaid as the 71st Mountaineer mascot.
The Fayette County native was selected out of four students as part of an official announcement during a WVU men’s basketball game in early March. Kincaid, a WVU student who was born and raised in the Mountain State not far away from the home of the 70th Mountaineer Mascot Braden Adkins, the new Mountaineer mascot is ready to don the buckskin and rifle ahead of an official coronation ceremony that’s scheduled to take place on April 4.
“I think it’s probably the greatest burden I will bear because I get to do something that I love so much,” said Kincaid. “It’s going to be closer to 400 days of just doing, but you know, that’s something that my family has always done, and I’m ready for it,” he said.
Kincaid, who was born and raised in Fayetteville, participated in a cheer-off in late February where he, along with the three other participants, took part in a combination of fan chants, interactions with the WVU community, and an expression of Mountaineer spirit. For the West Virginia native, the whole experience was considered otherworldly as he expressed an energy that he felt was saved as part of his WVU roots with his mom and other members of his family being alums for the university. Added to what he feels was a good interview session with the selection committee along with the opportunity to represent WVU, the junior accounting student felt he showed how he could represent both the university and the state as the 71st Mountaineer mascot.
“Something had me fired up that night, and I think it was the passion to really want to win it and that itch, as well as a lot of caffeine,” said Kincaid. “Down to that cheer-off, actually (at some point), I realized (I said to myself), ‘Man, I really put it all out there,’ and that was when I was completely content with what happened,” he said.
After Kincaid was officially selected as the Mountaineer, Braden Adkins, reached out to him in the days after the announcement was made. According to the new Mountaineer mascot, the two discussed both their lives being born and raised in south central West Virginia (Adkins is from Richwood, less than an hour away from Fayetteville) as well as their familial connections with the university with at least one of their parents attending WVU while they were younger. They both also talked about the expectations of being the Mountaineer mascot, goals that Kincaid feels like he can achieve.
“We Facetimed for probably an hour just about little stuff,” said Kincaid on WAJR’s Talk of the Town regarding his conversation with Adkins. “What I can do, what I’m expected to do for the next year, and how he wanted to make sure that I was ready for it and things that I can do differently that he did, that he wants me to do better than him,” he said.
The hope for Kincaid when he officially passes the rifle of the Mountaineer is that he’ll be able to proudly display the spirit he has not only for WVU but also for the state he grew up in. In being the 71st Mountaineer mascot, Kincaid will take part in just about every single public appearance involving the university, whether it is athletic events, municipal parades, or event appearances at Mountain State cities and towns. As he readies to don the coonskin cap and the buckskins for the next 400 days, Kincaid is ready to make his family, his university, and his home state proud.
“When I’m done, I want people to think of me in a light that is, ‘Wow, this guy loves West Virginia, or this guy loves Fayette,’ whatever they want to nitpick it down to,” said Kincaid. “I want to make sure that my love for everything is expressed,” he said.
Kincaid will officially accept the rifle and the responsibilities of the Mountaineer mascot from Adkins during a formal “Passing of the Rifle” ceremony at 6 p.m. April 4 in the Mountainlair.