Apr. 3—MORGANTOWN — It was Texas Tech men's basketball coach Grant McCasland on the other end of Wren Baker's phone call.
And McCasland barely gave WVU's athletic director a moment to speak before chiming in his two cents.
"Ross freaking Hodge, " Baker recalled McCasland's words on Thursday after Hodge's introductory press conference that made him WVU's 24th men's basketball head coach. "He's ready."
Baker placed another call to Michigan head coach Dusty May ... and it became nearly the identical story.
"Ross Hodge, he's ready, " May told Baker.
"Dusty, I actually called you to talk about six potential candidates, " Baker continued.
Didn't matter.
Other calls were made in Baker's extensive research, calls to other athletic directors and head coaches from the American Athletic Conference, where Hodge's North Texas team resides.
"One of the people I talked to said please hire Hodge, because they were tired of trying to compete against him, " Baker said.
If there is a general sense out there in the WVU fan base that Baker took a gamble on hiring Hodge, that was not the story being told on this day.
Look, to be sure, maybe there should be some sense of concern. Hodge has been a Division I head coach for all of two seasons.
He's never coached a game in the NCAA tournament other than as an assistant coach.
As a head coach, Hodge has only faced two opponents ranked in the Top 25 and lost both times.
This is not exactly a resum é that screams big-time hire.
So why were so many college basketball insiders so quick to sing Hodge's praise ?
"I've been really fortunate to have been a part of teams that played in the NCAA tournament and won games in the NCAA tournament, " Hodge said. "I've had the opportunity to look at it from afar. I do know what it takes. I'm not confused on that. It's something I'm very confident in."
The other side of the story is the stats and analytics don't lie. If you happen to be a college athletic director driven to find a defensive-minded genius—and Wren Baker admits his focus in this search centered around the defensive numbers—then North Texas wasn't exactly a bad starting point.
The Mean Green, in terms of the better part of the last 10 years, doesn't have to shy away from touting its defensive metrics when compared to the big boys of college basketball.
No, North Texas never got the five-star recruits, nor did it play the toughest schedule in the country.
But, at the end of each season, you hold up your team's defensive metrics and North Texas would hold up its numbers, and the Mean Green's statistics were right there with the best in the country.
"When I talked to Grant McCasland about North Texas' defense, he always told me that it was all Ross Hodge, " Baker said.
Hodge just may be ready to take this leap. He certainly has paid his dues.
He met his wife Shelly while he was a graduate assistant at Texas A &M Commerce.
"Most of you probably haven't heard of that school before, " Hodge said.
It wasn't long before he got his first job as an assistant coach, but it was at the bottom of the totem pole, so to speak, at a junior college in Paris, Texas.
"I made $8, 000, had a meal card and had a residency in the dorm, " Hodge recalled.
That dorm room just happened to be next to where the school's baseball team was housed.
That didn't scare Shelly away.
"Anyone who is going to come and spend some time with you in a dorm next to a junior-college baseball team, you know that's a winner right there, " Hodge ...
