West Virginia men’s basketball added football player Aden Tagaloa-Nelson to their roster over the weekend, a move that was in the making for some time.
Interim head coach Josh Eilert discussed the move as well as what he can bring to the Mountaineers going forward.
Tagaloa-Nelson is a freshman safety on the WVU football team, and is from Lexington, Kentucky. Before coming to WVU, Tagaloa-Nelson was playing where Eilert was recruiting. Because of his affiliation to WVU because of the football team, Eilert was introduced to him.
“I met Aden probably over a year ago. I was out on the recruiting trail, out in Kentucky, and I met him, and I saw him play for the first time when I was scouting someone else. They introduced me to him because he was committed to West Virginia to play football,” Eilert said.
“He’s a good basketball player. He was a tough-minded, strong guard, and he competed. He was such a nice young man, and I carried on that relationship with him.”
That relationship included Eilert extending the offer for him to show up and talk to him if he needs anything. Tagaloa-Nelson showed up to Eilert’s office, and they got him in multiple open gym sessions.
“He showed up in the fall and stopped by and introduced himself to the staff. I told him, if you want to get a run in, I know he loved the game of basketball, come by, and jump in open gym with our guys. He played a couple opportunities he took to play with our guys, so our guys knew him,” Eilert said.
Once the football season ended, Eilert added him to the roster after he had discussions with head football coach Neal Brown.
“We had a couple conversations even in the fall about it before jumping into open gym and he was good with it. I certainly wanted to make sure it was good with Coach Brown. Football is his priority, and it will continue to be his priority but if he can help us and he wants to be involved, I’d love to have him each and every day,” Eilert said.
Eilert said he’s going to be a great add to the roster, even if that means he’s only playing in practice.
“He’s just a high character kid and a guy that wants to compete every day and we’re really happy to have Aden in whatever capacity that may be,” Eilert said. “He’s just a program guy. A guy that’s going to give it everything he’s got, every single day and who doesn’t want a strong, defensive minded guy on the floor each and every day to turn up the pressure in practice. If that’s all he does, that’s helpful to us.”
