WVU Assistant Sheds Light on North Carolina AD's NCAA Tournament Incentive

Somehow, West Virginia was left out of the NCAA Tournament on Sunday night, and there has not been an explanation given that has made sense as to why.

Committee chair Bubba Cunningham said during the Selection Sunday show, "The last four teams that were out, it was a tough call. The first team out was West Virginia. They had an outstanding year, and unfortunately, knowing Tucker DeVries was hurt...player availability is something that we talk about quite a bit."

In what world does a player's injury that happened three months ago matter? It would be one thing if all or most of West Virginia's Quad 1 wins came with DeVries on the floor, but that's not the case. As a matter of fact, four of their six Quad 1 wins came after DeVries went down. WVU had three more Quad 1 wins without Tucker DeVries than North Carolina had all season.

The decision to put North Carolina in and leave West Virginia out feels influenced. Bubba Cunningham is also the athletic director at North Carolina and is incentivized if the Tar Heels make the NCAA Tournament.

WVU assistant head coach Chester Frazier found online that Cunningham receives a $104k bonus for North Carolina making the tournament and posted the screenshot of the report on his Instagram account.

Chester Frazier seems to know why WVU got snubbed pic.twitter.com/ZcZhnZkxpN
— Hot Rod (@HoldTheRopeRR) March 17, 2025

Vice chair of the committee, Keith Gill, assured the viewing audience that Cunningham had no influence on the result.

"As the vice chair, I managed all the conversations we had about North Carolina and we had quite a few," Gill stated. "Our policies require the AD of any school to leave the room for those discussions and they’re not allowed to participate in any vote as well.”

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