Why the Ross Hodge Comparison to Neal Brown is Lazy and Inaccurate

No one is thrilled with the way the first season went for Ross Hodge at West Virginia, including Ross Hodge himself. The Mountaineers left several opportunities on the table to win games and lost a handful of games they had no business losing. At the same time, they also won some games they had no business winning, which leads us to the 18-14 mark they finished with.

I don't have a clue where this narrative started, but all season long, I saw a number of WVU fans in the comment section of our social media accounts comparing Hodge to that of former Mountaineer football coach Neal Brown. Those comparisons were thrown out there again under one of our articles following the team's 20-point loss to BYU.

This is why it's a lazy and inaccurate take.

No. 1: There is a true identity

In year one, fans were scratching their heads and squinting really hard to try to figure out what it is that Neal Brown wanted his football team to be, and that's on both sides of the ball. Offensively, they couldn't run the ball to save their life in 2019, even worse than this past season if you can believe that, and had no luck throwing it either. It took nearly five years for West Virginia to truly establish an identity on the offensive side of the ball. Defensively, well, aside from the 2020 COVID-shortened season, they had a lot of shortcomings and went through three coordinators if you count Jeff Koonz's interim stint. There is no questioning what it is that Hodge wants his team to lean into — defense.

No. 2: Proof of concept

When Wren Baker hired Ross Hodge, he kept pointing to the defensive analytics. To win in this league, you have to be elite on that end of the floor. And guess what? WVU was exactly that in year one. West Virginia is currently 7th nationally in scoring defense (64.7 ppg/allowed), 38th in opponent field goal percentage (41.6%), and 28th in defensive efficiency (0,997). For him to have this team play that level of defense is remarkable when you consider Treysen Eaglestaff and Honor Huff were expected to be liabilities on that end of the floor. The offense clearly needs improvement, and that will come with better athletes. For year one, though? He did exactly what he had always been successful with. If the defense was an eyesore, then I think there would be more reason to sound the alarm.

No. 3: More year one success

There is no true way to compare a 12-game football season to a 31-game basketball regular season, except for looking at the quality of wins, the poor losses, and where you finished in the league standings. Neal Brown finished 8th in a then 10-team Big 12 with five of his seven losses coming by two or more possessions.

Ross Hodge beat two ranked teams in Kansas and BYU, who have the top two projected picks in this year's draft, while also picking up two-game sweeps over UCF, which is likely a tournament team, and Cincinnati. Don't get me wrong, the losses to Xavier, Wake Forest, Utah, and Kansas State are inexcusable, but success-wise, Hodge accomplished way more in his first year on the job, and it's not even close. The Mountaineers were picked to finish 11th in the league, and they ended up seventh. Finishing in the top half of the best league in America in year one with subpar talent is hard to fathom.

Let's put a bow on this thing

While I just listed a bunch of reasons why fans should have some optimism for the basketball program, you are right to be upset and frustrated. I get it. There are things Hodge clearly has to fix heading into next season. My point here is that it's year one, and he finished one win shy of the mark Darian DeVries had a year ago. Folks, that is not Neal Brown vibes.