×

A look at a few candidates for WVU’s next coach

MORGANTOWN — A few random thoughts to get through the weekend:

Nobody asked me but my top three (drum roll, please!) choices to replace Darian DeVries as men’s basketball coach would be Drake coach Ben McCollum, Washington coach Jerrod Calhoun and current assistant Chet Frazier.

Terribly impressed with what I saw of McCollum’s Bulldogs in their first-round upset victory over Missouri of the SEC in the NCAA Tournament, piercing the veil of dominance the SEC is casting over collegiate sports.

His roots crossed with WVU AD Wren Baker at Northwest Missouri State, where McCollum won an NCAA title.

He talked about the rumors circulating around him after winning over Missouri.

“Some of those rumors have been around for six, seven, eight years,” McCollum said. “It’s just the nature of having a level of success. It’s a kind of gift and a curse, I guess. I’ve tried over the years — you’ve learned how to not have a divided heart and to focus everything on the team that you have. That’s what I’ll continue to do, is focus all my attention on this team.”

The thing is, Baker has to jump on this one quickly as he is going to be a hot commodity on the job market.

As for Calhoun, the former Fairmont State coach and Bob Huggins’ assistant at WVU who rebuilt the Youngstown State program and then went to Utah State where he earned an NCAA bid in his first season, he has all the necessary ingredients to move in here.

WVU is not going to go after the $6 million man for the job, so Calhoun would be a strong fit with local ties and has proven he can build a program.

The lingering question is can he do it on this level.

Frazier is a long-time assistant at major programs, last with Illinois, and was a key member of DeVries staff who has a warm relationship with some of the current players. He well may be able to keep Sencire Harris and Amani Hansberry around for next season rather than forcing a new man to do another complete rebuild.

And it would be nice to see Baker do an interview with and give Erik Martin, the former Huggins assistant who had a huge season including Coach of the Year honors at South Carolina, a shot to take a run at the job.

n n n

What does a basketball coach and his family do with all their team gear when they suddenly quit their job and move on to another school?

Never really thought about that before, but now that I do I hope Darian, Tucker and the DeVries stop by our local Goodwill Store here in town and make a gift of it.

Surely, in a year, it wasn’t worn out.

And just as surely, they don’t want to be seen walking down Main Street in Bloomington, Ind., wearing the Flying WV logo.

And, if they have any pepperoni rolls left over, pretty sure they can find someone to take them off their hands.

n n n

Here’s something that’s always been on my mind, which will tell you just how deep of a thinker I am.

Why do schools think it is necessary to include membership in the local country club as a perk in the contract?

Like at $3, $4 or $5 million a year cannot a coach buy a membership in the club himself?

To be honest, if I was an athletic director and a coach told me it was a deal breaker not to include a country club membership in his contract, then I’d wish him the best of luck with his next employer because it wouldn’t be me.

That is, of course, unless it was the golf coach.

n n n

And speaking of coaches, as we have been, Sean Cleary, the women’s track and field and cross-country coach, joined his runner, Ceili McCabe, who took home gold twice in the NCAAs as the individual 3,000-meter run and the distance medley relay, as the Mid-Atlantic Region Women’s Coach and Athlete of the Year.

No one does a better nor more low-key job of creating champions than Cleary and it remains a tragic shame that he doesn’t also have a men’s team to work with.

n n n

Because of what’s gone on in football and basketball at WVU over the past few years the national image of the athletic department is one of chaos and failure, but it is anything but.

You had three NCAA championships in two days recently with Cleary and McCabe’s performances to go with the rifle team reclaiming the NCAA title, the school’s 20th national championship.

Five wrestlers qualified for the NCAAs including the No. 2 seeded Peyton Hall, the women’s basketball team despite playing musical coaches over the last four years is a No. 6 seed and playing its first game Saturday in the NCAAs and the baseball team went into the weekend’s action with a critical home series against Arizona at 18-1.

They have cracked the Top 25 but that’s way too low for this talented team with first-year coach Steve Sabins.

Starting at $3.92/week.

Subscribe Today