Hodge impressed with where his team is at mid-summer
West Virginia head coach Ross Hodge is entering year one at the helm of the Mountaineers, with only one carryover player from last year’s roster.
While it’s still early on, Hodge has liked what he’s seen so far from his roster as they continue to come together.
“It’s a little too early because I’ve always said it’s hard to get better when you’re just playing against yourself all the time. You know, you can really get better when you start playing against other teams and other scrimmages and games. That’s how you evolve and you grow as a team and you try to you try to have as much foresight as you can as a coach to the vision of what it’s going to look like. But until you really get into that and you start. But so you don’t really know,” Hodge said.
Hodge has undergone a major roster transformation this offseason, using the transfer portal and a strong freshman class to his advantage.
One of the areas Hodge thinks he has an advantage in when recruiting is the ability to elevate players by coaching and developing them, while also realizing, those same players are going to have to want to be coached.
“I think a big part of that, and it’ll probably come back to a lot of any questions as far as, you know, you’re knocking a lot of that out in the recruiting process itself. And you’re doing your research, you’re finding out, okay, will these players allow us to push them out of their comfort zone, what is actually in their heart, do they want to be great, do they want to be coached, do they allow you to coach them,” Hodge said.
Hodge is hoping to build a culture similar to the teams he coached at North Texas, which he led to the NIT Championship game this past season. While there, he also had to rebuild on an almost yearly basis.
“I think that’s kind of one of the best gifts that players can give coaches, is legitimately what you just talked about. Are you going to let us push you past the point of where you’re comfortable? There’s a proverb that says, when a student is ready, a teacher will appear, and a lot of that is true. I’ve always said, I’ve never, I’ve never coached a player that didn’t get it, that wanted to get it,” Hodge said.
Hodge believes in the process and also believes that if he can find good people, he can help them become good players.
“The guys that really want to get it, that want to be great, that want to be great players, once they realize that you care about them as a person, and they’ll let you coach them, but a lot of that is done in the recruiting process. You’ve got to recruit guys that let you coach them,” Hodge said.
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