As West Virginia head men’s basketball coach Darian DeVries was introduced on Thursday, he announced his son Tucker would be joining him.
“Also have my son Tucker, who will be joining us for his senior year. It’s always nice when you get your first recruit, so had to work hard this morning to get that one done,” DeVries said in his press conference.
Tucker is listed at 6-foot-7, and is the back-to-back Missouri Valley Conference Player of the year, averaging 21.6 points per game this past season. He has one year of eligibility remaining.
Tucker was spotted in a sling on Thursday, something he said was due to shoulder surgery he had on Tuesday.
“I had surgery on Tuesday. Hopefully recovery shouldn’t be too long and just had to fix some things that occurred about halfway through the year,” Tucker DeVries said.
He later added this was an injury that occurred on the same shoulder as a shoulder injury he sustained last season, but that it should be good to go once he recovers.
“Been fairly banged up, halfway through the year had to battle through some things, even thought about shutting it down one or two times throughout the year,” DeVries said. “I was able to do enough to feel like I could be out there and help the team. Then after the season was over we worried abut fixing it and try to get back healthy as quickly as possible to get back to working for next year.”
Tucker DeVries now comes to WVU with his dad and has high expectations for this team. He said that this was his first time in the state of West Virginia, but has only heard good things.
“Heard a lot of great things about it and finally being here, you can understand and feel all those great things people talk about it,” he said.
He now comes to WVU for his final season of college basketball, and just days after his Drake squad was bounced from the NCAA Tournament. He said a lot of the characteristics of what his dad looks for in a player is something he brings.
“A lot of what my dad talked about in the press conference of just being highly competitive, doing whatever we can to try and win games and just being super disciplined and doing it the right way. Always working hard to improve and get to a point where we feel confident we can win a lot of games,” Tucker DeVries said.
He added that his dad coming to WVU meant he was going to also come to WVU.
“I think for him it was a family decision as a whole, what felt right for everybody. He certainly felt like this is a place he can be successful and was excited to be apart of,” Tucker DeVries said. “We were all in full support of that and in support of him. For me to be able to come here for my senior year and be apart of all this, I’m looking really forward to it and I’m super excited to be apart of it.”
