West Virginia is hiring Drake's Darian DeVries as its next men's basketball coach, the school announced Sunday shortly after sources confirmed the move to CBS Sports' Matt Norlander on Sunday. DeVries replaces Josh Eilert, who took over on an interim basis during the 2023-24 season after legendary coach Bob Huggins resigned from his post last summer following his arrest on a driving under the influence of alcohol charge.
His new contract at the school is for five years, according to Norlander.
DeVries, 48, has been the coach at Drake for the past six seasons. DeVries helped the Bulldogs win 20 or more games in all six of those seasons at the helm and guided the program to three NCAA Tournament appearances in the last four season. Drake's season came to a close earlier this week with a loss to Washington State in the first round of the NCAA Tournament after the Bulldogs won the Missouri Valley Conference Tournament.
DeVries is an Iowa native who played for Northern Iowa. DeVries started his coaching career at Creighton and spent 20 seasons on the staff as a student manager and an assistant coach. DeVries succeeded Niko Medved, who left to take the job at Colorado State in 2018, at Drake.
DeVries will take over a WVU program that went 9-23 this past season. The Mountaineers finished Big 12 play with a 4-14 record — tied with Oklahoma State for the worst in the league. WVU ended its season by losing 10 of its final 11 games.
Before Huggins exited the program, West Virginia reached the NCAA Tournament in 13 of the 18 prior seasons that the tournament was held. Huggins guided WVU to its second Final Four appearance in program history during the 2009-10 season.
It's not out of the realm of possibility that DeVries' son, Tucker DeVries, enters the transfer portal and follows his father to West Virginia. The younger DeVries is one of the best mid-major players in college basketball and is a two-time Missouri Valley Conference Player of the Year. DeVries averaged 21.6 points, 6.9 rebounds and 3.5 assists this past season.
