Interim WVU head coach Josh Eilert announces 2023-24 staff
West Virgina switched out their head coaching position upon Bob Huggins’ resignation and Josh Eilert’s hire as the program’s interim. Now, the Mountaineers have shuffled the rest of the deck in order to announce his staff for the upcoming ’23-’24 season.
The Mountaineers shared Eilert’s new assistants in a press release earlier this morning. As of today, Da’Sean Butler, DerMarr Johnson, Jordan McCabe, and Alex Ruoff, all former players or people with previous connections to Morgantown, will be the assistant coaches for the men’s basketball program this season.
Butler spent last season as an assistant video coordinator with the New York Knicks last season. He previously served as a graduate assistant for the program back in 2012-2013. Now, with plenty of experience in coaching around the NBA, he returns to West Virginia as the program’s all-time winningest player and third-leading scorer as well as a member of the school’s Sports Hall of Fame.
After that, Johnson is being retained after being hired by WVU back in mid-January. After his professional playing career, he went back to his alma mater of Cincinnati as a member of their program.
From there, we reach two other former Mountaineers. In McCabe’s case, he is the staff’s most recent player after competing for West Virginia from 2018-2021. That was before he transferred to UNLV for his final two seasons. In his three seasons at WVU, he appeared in 94 games and averaged 3.7 points and 1.8 assists.
As for Ruoff, he is back for a second year after coaching as a grad-assistant last season. After leaving the West Virginia as their all-time best three-point shooter as well as a long pro career, he retired and came back to Morgantown a season ago.
Beyond these moves, five other positions were mentioned in the release on Eilert’s staff. Ron Everhart will be moving from an assistant role to become their director of community relations and player outreach. Trent Michaels will also be assuming a new role by moving from operations coordinator to director of men’s basketball operation.
Finally, Jay Kuntz, Jarded Kortsen, and Tyler Chang will all retain their roles as director of player personnel/recruiting, video and scouting coordinator, and athletic data statistician respectively.