COLUMN: Do not inform Mark Kellogg how a lot enjoyable the switch portal is meant to be

MORGANTOWN — Mark Kellogg thought he had a plan. Or perhaps it was a plan the WVU ladies’s basketball coach merely needed to alter various instances. Or perhaps it was an meeting of excellent concepts with a number of subheads and choices hooked up to them.

He knew he had one thing, although, Kellogg knew that for certain. The dozens of spreadsheets filling up his laptop display this previous spring was proof of that.

“You’re just trying to prepare as much as you possibly can ahead of time, but you can’t,” Kellogg mentioned final week throughout an open follow session. “I think there was one day I had, like, 13 or 14 tabs open of different spreadsheets, and I was like the GM trying to go, ‘If this kid comes, this changes this,’ and then I’d have to go to the new spreadsheet. ‘This one commits, this is what it looks like.’ ”

The activity at hand: Kellogg needed to rebuild WVU’s roster.

Now, that sounds easy sufficient, however let’s have a look at the general environment of the duty.

Kellogg and the Mountaineers had simply raised the bar days earlier than, having performed in entrance of two sold-out crowds inside Hope Coliseum whereas internet hosting a NCAA event regional for the primary time since 1992. That got here all of 1 week after the Mountaineers received the Big 12 event for the primary time since 2017. 

Trying to construct a roster for a middle-of-the highway convention group with small expectations is one factor. Kellogg was making an attempt to capitalize on historical past and for a WVU ladies’s program that had regularly raised the bar over his first two seasons on the college.

That’s somewhat extra difficult and it ended up being three weeks of chaos for Kellogg and his teaching workers, or as Kellogg put it, “hectic.”

Now, we’ll throw in some variables.

In the top, he completed with a recruiting class of 1 incoming freshman and 9 additions by way of the switch portal to associate with returners Gia Cooke and Madison Parrish.

He didn’t start the journey anticipating to fill 10 spots.

“We thought we had a couple more that were going to come back initially and then they made some decisions to go a different direction,” Kellogg mentioned.

Power ahead Carter McCray – a starter final season – determined to switch for a fourth time in 4 seasons and ended up at Michigan State. Riley Makalusky, a key contributor from final season, entered the portal very late and ended up at Tennessee.

That stuff actually occurs. If it occurs when the scenario requires changing just some gamers, superb. Kellogg now needed to substitute 4 starters, their backups and a backup for Cooke, too.

The portal opened on April 6, let the chaos start.

He introduced the signing of former Pitt participant Divine Tumba a day later. The 6-foot-2 freshman ahead had redshirted at Pitt final season. Just to advance the story, Kellogg additionally signed sophomore guard Nylah Wilson, a former five-star prospect out of Chester, Va. who was Pitt’s highest-ranked recruit final season in that program’s historical past.

Two former Pitt gamers now in Morgantown?

“We won’t hold it against them,” Kellogg joked.

On April 10, Kellogg introduced the signing of former George Mason guard “ZaZa” Walton. Just a few days later, former Marquette ahead Skylar Forbes was on board.

And then McCray and Makalusky introduced they have been leaving WVU for the portal.

“We had a kid leave, and I think 48 hours later we had another kid on campus and committed, so that’s literally how quickly the process goes,” Kellogg mentioned.

Not all of that course of fell on Kellogg’s shoulders or his spreadsheets. Part of this story additionally belongs to Cooke and Parrish, who grew to become hosts for the entire gamers coming in. They added their voice, too, whether or not it was about how this system is run or about Morgantown itself.

“It felt like we had someone new in on a visit every day,” Cooke mentioned. “The coaches said we had someone else coming in and I would just look over at Maddie, like, ‘Are we ready?’ ”

The names piled on, one after the opposite. Former UCF middle Khyala Ngodu got here on board after which there was 6-foot-7 middle Hawa Doumbouya. Another George Mason product – Kennedy Harris – signed up, as did former BYU guard Marya Hudgins.

A high 100 freshman in Chante Murray was signed. A former West Virginia Player of the Year in Alexis Bordas (a Duquesne switch) was added.

And then, whew, that just about sums it up. It was not a journey of 1,000 steps to construct WVU’s roster. It took, in Kellogg’s estimation, all of 18 days.

Yes, all of us anticipate a sure stage of chaos within the switch portal. To a point, there’s a bidding course of on high of the recruiting course of. One college could supply extra NIL funding for a sure participant. Kellogg needed to determine whether or not or to not up his ante, too.

Doing all of that to rebuild a roster for a program with championship aspirations in simply three weeks – which may be an all-timer.

“We did bring in 11 players, I think, in an 18-day period and signed 10 of them,” Kellogg mentioned. “So, it was hot and heavy. That was a little hectic, a little stressful in certain situations, but we really, really like the group we have.”