Eilert, West Virginia looking to make their own waves down the stretch
Josh Eilert has no regrets.
Regardless of how the rest of the West Virginia basketball season unfolds and whether or not he has his role atop the program beyond this year, the opportunity to lead it has been invaluable.
Eilert thinks back to a conversation he had with his close friend Boston Celtics head coach Joe Mazulla, a former player for the Mountaineers, prior to taking the job. It was always going to be a difficult assignment but with that comes growth both professionally and personally.
Even in the middle of Big 12 Conference play and the challenges that presents, Eilert believes that every day in the role has been more rewarding and things have started to slow down more.
“The huge waves have started to settle. Early in the process it felt like you’re getting hit with huge wave after huge wave and we were all new to this,” he said.
Eilert is a first-time head coach and each of his four assistants is young in their careers which has meant trying to build chemistry between each other while navigating all of the challenges that have been thrown their way in the form of an ever-changing roster.
Related: West Virginia head coach Josh Eilert press conference summary 2/8/24
But now sitting at 8-14 with only nine regular-season games remaining, Eilert believes that both he and his coaching staff have really started to settle into their roles. Now, it's time to try to make some waves of their own.
“It’s starting to calm a bit. We’re starting to settle into our positions and certainly we wish it would have played out a little differently from the jump and had our whole roster but that wasn’t the case,” he said. “We made the most of it and now we’re trying to make the most of the last nine games.”
The position has been a rewarding one despite the challenges because it’s allowed Eilert to grow and evolve his coaching methods as he’s been forced to adapt on the fly. The interim head coach didn’t inherit a team that was already well-established and instead had to add to it and develop chemistry.
That doesn’t come easy and at times has been a two-step forward, one-step-back type of deal. But Eilert is making the most of the time he has in this role.
“Now we’re trying at the end of the season to settle into our groove to a point where it’s a well-oiled machine and we’re competing night in and night out in the hardest conference in the country,” he said.
“We have a lot of potential still within us. We’ve got to maximize that potential,” he added.
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