2025 WVU Coaches Caravan Comes To Wheeling For Final Stop | News, Sports, Jobs

West Virginia University head football coach Rich Rodriguez, head men’s basketball coach Ross Hodge, head women’s basketball coach Mark Kellogg, and head men’s soccer coach Dan Stratford were the guests of honor at Oglebay, the final stop of six for the Caravan, along with athletic director Wren Baker, broadcaster Tony Caridi and the WVU Mountaineer.

The WVU Coaches Caravan had stopped in Parkersburg, Washington D.C., Glade Springs, Martinsburg and Pittsburgh in a tour that began May 5 and concluded on Monday, May 12.

On stage at the Wilson Lodge, WVU fans were introduced to first-year head coach Ross Hodge, coming over from North Texas to pace the sideline for the Mountaineers, and were re-introduced to Rodriguez, whose first stop at WVU ended in 2007.

With Caridi serving as moderator throughout the night, Baker was the first to speak on topics ranging from President Trump’s possible college sports commission, to conference realignment, to his sneaker collection. The four head coaches next formed a panel and discussed things like each’s visions for their upcoming seasons, and how they’ve changed as coaches throughout the years.

Rodriguez regaled the crowd with stories from his time at Glenville State College and Salem University, while also reflecting on his own journey as a coach.

“All the coaches will tell you that we’ve all been humbled at some point in our lives,” he said. “I’m not the same coach I was 20 years ago. Some coaches say they’ve got 20-something years of experience but they do the same thing every year, so they got one year of experience repeated 20 times.

“I’m a better coach than I was a month ago, a year ago, two years ago, 20 years ago. All these other coaches here are the same way. Every coach has to adapt a little bit to what they have, I’m still adapting a little bit to what we have here.”

MEN OF THE PEOPLE

On their travels over the last seven days, the Caravan had hit multiple stops within the Mountain state and outside of it- and though the locations had changed, one thing remained the same throughout their roadtrip culminating in Wheeling.

“I think it just kind of reaffirms the passion that the fanbase has for their Mountaineers,” Kellogg said of the Caravan. “Each stop is a little different but the one thing that never changes is the passion. People are proud of their Mountaineers and they’ll support you if you’re a winner and if you love on them they’ll love you back. It’s year three for me coming here and it just seems to get better and better each time we come up here.”

“It doesn’t take long to feel how passionate people are about WVU sports and how much it means to them- you hear the stories of their parents and their parents’ parents going to Mountaineer basketball games,” Hodge said. “You can really feel that as soon as you step into the state. It truly is a unique fanbase and I’m truly appreciative of being able to represent them.”

BRAVE NEW WORLD

Revenue-sharing with student-athletes has been the hottest of hot-button topics in college sports, and Wren Baker spent much of his half-hour talk with Caridi on the issue.

With NIL already having blown the doors off the longstanding rules of college athletics, and with another multi-billion dollar lawsuit poised to enforce some form of a pay-to-play model between schools and players, Baker spoke frankly about the future.

“Certainly this is one of the most paradigm-shifting times ever in college athletics, and we’re in an industry that changes an awful lot very quickly,” Baker said. “What we’ve seen over the last two or three years and what we’re facing over the next 18 to 24 months is certainly going to set the course of college athletics.”

“It’s going to be really important, whether it’s from some kind of presidential executive order or something, ultimately we need the folks in Washington D.C. to help,” he later added when speaking about the possible formation of a federal college sports commission.

Baker said that he had been lobbying in the state and national capitals a month ago, and noted the immense deficits some schools are facing, and the effect that the current landscape could have on women’s sports and Olympic sports.

“Ultimately, it’s not sustainable, that’s the bottom line, the system we have is not sustainable,” Baker said.

Baker said WVU is exploring new ways to create revenue, including an increase of naming rights, and praised his coaches for being creative in finding ways to compete.

LONG TIME NO SEE

The week-long road trip was a chance for the coaches in attendance to get to know eachother better, but for the pair of Mark Kellogg and Ross Hodge, it was a new chapter of a relationship which could be rewound decades.

“Coach Kellogg’s a Texas guy as well,” Hodge said. “When we were both in college we worked summer basketball camps together for the Dallas Mavericks. To see that come full circle’s been crazy.”

“I’ve known Ross for 26, maybe 27 years, going all the way back to working Dallas Maverick basketball camps when we were in college,” Kellogg said. “It’s been great to travel with him and all the coaches.”

Kellogg and Ross’ blast from the past was one interesting angle between a group of four who have a collective 36 years and 485 wins at major schools.

“Coach Rodriguez has been extremely welcoming and supportive- after I got the job, he sent me a really nice text message a couple days later,” Hodge said. “All the administrative staff and the different coaches, everybody’s been really welcoming and really helpful. I’m very thankful for them.”

“It’s been fantastic,” Kellogg said of the Caravan. “As coaches, you’re always trying to pick each other’s brains and learn some stuff. You talk about culture of the athletic department- Wren Baker has been phenomenal in all of that.”

RICH ROD’S LAST STOP?

At multiple points throughout the night, Baker or Rodriguez made mention of the veteran coach’s desire to have his tenure at his alma mater be the final job of his wide-ranging coaching career.

“He had a very clear passion for coming back home and wanting to help his school to where he wanted it to be, his football program, his state,” Baker said. “It was clear that he wanted an opportunity to come back to West Virginia and have it be his last job. He wants to go out a winner. I thought ultimately that made a ton of sense, when you hear his passion and his love and his zeal for this place.”

“I am extremely blessed to be back at West Virginia,” Rodriguez said. “That being said, I did not win a lottery ticket to get this job. These great players that we had in the early 2000’s helped, the success that we had the last couple of years at Jax State helped, but I think more than anything else, I tried to sell Wren and the folks who were interested that this is it for me. Everything that I have, everything that our players have, everything that our staff will have, will be to help us win and win the right way.”