West Virginia Basketball Punts Coaching Search Amid Messy Reports About Bob Huggins, Boosters Pulling Strings

West Virginia named former assistant Josh Eilert as interim head coach of the men's basketball team for the 2023-24 season on Saturday. The Mountaineers chose to punt its nationwide coaching search until next offseason in an effort to keep the current roster together.

Eilert signed a one-year deal with the program and will have a chance to earn the full-time role with an impressive season. If West Virginia falls short of its expectations, the school will look elsewhere. It may even choose to do so if Eilert finds success in his lone season as the interim.

Either way, regardless of what the future holds, the Mountaineers are not naming a full-time head coach in wake of Bob Huggins' resignation. The 69-year-old Basketball Hall of Famer stepped down from his role last week after an alleged DUI and his daughter did not hold back.

There has been a lot of speculation about where the program would turn after Huggins' departure.

John Beilein, a College Basketball Hall of Fame inductee, was considered one of the targets for a long-term replacement. Jerrod Calhoun was another name that was being thrown around.

Beilein, who most recently spent two years unsuccessfully coaching the Cavaliers, previously spent 13 years at Michigan. He also coached West Virginia from 2002 to 2007.

Calhoun, 41, was an assistant under Huggins from 2007 to 2012. The 2023 Horizon League Coach of the Year is currently at Youngstown State, which went 24-10 last season.

Neither guy got the job. The Mountaineers postponed its coaching search until next year.

Why did West Virginia go the interim route?

This is where things get murky. It sounds like there was a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff going on in Morgantown, but it's not entirely clear as to who was responsible for what.

According to The Voice of Morgantown, it was boosters and players that were running the show. West Virginia officials had reportedly met with Beilein, but the prospective deal fell through after boosters and players were "unhappy" and threatened to pull donations or leave.

If true, the boosters and players got their wish. Beilein was not hired.

One day later, Hoppy Kercheval of MetroNews made things even more interesting.

He said that Huggins may have had his hands in the cookie jar. Other local message boards, like 247 Sports and Rivals, shared similar concerns.

However, the reports about Huggins were immediately rebutted by The Voice of Morgantown.

Ultimately, regardless of who was actually pulling the strings, West Virginia seemingly panicked and elevated from within on an interim basis. The full story of how the entire process went down may never be told, but — one way or another — it sounds like things were/are messy in Morgantown.