After winning 80% of his games as a head coach in his very young career, 44-year-old Ross Hodge was named the 24th head coach of West Virginia men’s basketball.
This comes after 8 seasons at North Texas, where he posted a 46-23 record as the head coach the last two seasons and assisted Texas Tech head coach Grant McCasland in the other six.
“Ross Hodge is the ultimate winner. He is an elite basketball coach and knows how to help his teams be the best they can be on the court. The separator is his love for people and genuine relationships off the court that give him the trust required to hold his teams to a championship level,” said McCasland when asked about his good friend. “He’ll win at West Virginia, but what I respect most is he’s an awesome husband, father, and friend,” he added.
McCasland is not the only head coach who has been asked about Hodge. Baylor head coach Scott Drew had nothing but nice things to say about the hire.
“Ross is a tremendous coach and leader of young men. He will do a terrific job at West Virginia. He is a home-run hire, and the Big 12 just got better,” Drew said.
The WVU head coaching search took a total of eight days. WVU athletic director Wren Baker considered coaches such as Richard Pitino, Jerrod Calhoun, and Ben McCollum before hiring Hodge for roughly 3 million dollars per year.
Head coaches around the league were not the only ones giving their praises to Hodge; members of the media also believe Wren Baker made the right decision. “West Virginia landed a program builder and a consistent winner in Ross Hodge,” said ESPN insider Paul Biancardi.
Another top college basketball analyst and an avid WVU supporter, Fran Fraschilla was one of the first people on X to speak his mind about the hire. Fran’s opinion matters in the sports world, and he will be the first one to tell a program that they made a bad decision.
“@WVU Hoops made a very good hire in Ross Hodge. A very capable ball coach, quietly super competitive and smart, and he’s got an athletic director who has total faith in him. Don’t see him cutting and running like the last guy,” said Fraschilla.
Wren Baker needed to find someone who was a good coach and one who would stay in the program for the next five years. After DeVries left after one year for the Indiana job, Baker did not want to make that same mistake again.
Hodge will continue to coach his North Texas squad in the semi-final of the NIT on Apr. 1 before traveling to Morgantown to begin building his roster from scratch for next season.
