Ross Hodge provides updates on team, players
West Virginia has now formally started practice, gearing up for the start of the 2025-26 season and head coach Ross Hodge has seen positives out of his team.
“We’ve established really good routines as a group. It’s a hard-working group, support each other. They’ve allowed us to coach them hard and direct,” he said.
There is still a lot of learning going on as you would expect with a roster that features 14 new players but Hodge believes that his team has started to progress to a critical point at the early stages. And that is simply that they’re making new mistakes instead of the same ones as before.
The head coach recognizes that you truly won’t learn a lot about yourself until you start to play other people but there is the opportunity to get better and identify what they’re trying to do.
When it comes to individual players, Hodge has seen a lot of growth out of several players since they arrived in the summer with one of those being transfer center Harlan Obioha. Last season, Obioha moved into the starting lineup at UNC Wilmington when conference play began and averaged 10.3 points and 6.6 rebounds per game while shooting 64.8% from the field.
At 7-foot, Obioha has impressive size but one of the focuses this summer was getting into better shape and transforming his body which he has successfully accomplished. The center has gone from around 300-pounds to 267-pounds and did it the right way by losing bad weight and adding muscle.
“The first thing that jumps out at you is the way he looks. Then being able to be lighter. Lighter on his feet. He’s always had incredible hands, incredible feet,” Hodge said. “He was a high-end football player coming out of high school so he has great touch, great hands, great feet and now he’s just able to be a little lighter on his second jump and it allows him to play longer stretches of quality basketball.”
The Mountaineers also brought in two transfers that can shoot the basketball in Treysen Eaglestaff and Honor Huff and both have impressed on that front with their range and the space it can create.
“Both of those players have a gravitational pull that you have to know where they are on the floor because if you make a mistake or half a second the ball is in their hands and out of their hands and they shoot it at a real high clip,” Hodge said.
The pair have also proven to be underrated passers and unselfish and at times almost too much.
“I want them to be more selfish,” Hodge said.
On the injury front, Hodge said that transfer forward Jackson Fields is making his way back from off-season surgery to his non-shooting hand. His ability to run was never affected, while he can shoot the basketball but is still a couple of weeks away from having the pins out of his wrist.
“He really tries to mimic as many drills as he can offensively and defensively without a ball because you don’t want a random ricochet or something to hit his thumb,” Hodge said. “Progressing well, things are trending positively.”
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