The McNeese State head coach called his player on Thursday and in the first half of the NCAA Tournament in Providence, Rhode, he announced the Associated Press.
ROADLEY, Providence – President McNeese Wade Ruth sat down with Will Wade when he hired him as a basketball coach and planned for two years. I made an NCAA tournament in my first year and won the game in the second.
He then thought it might be difficult to walk around.
And he was right in all respects.
“I might never have another plan,” Ruth said after the No. 5 Cowboys upset No. 5 seed Clemson 69-67 in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Thursday. “Because that worked really well.”
Wade is heading to North Carolina to revive his career at Southland Conference School in Lake Charles, Louisiana. For Ruth, it was always the risk of taking on someone who was one of the sport’s best young coaches before his career was hit by a sideline by scandal.
“We’ve been planning for two years and we’re transparent with each other,” Ruth told The Associated Press in a corridor beneath the stage at the Amica Mutual Pavilion. “We needed a coach. We thought this was where we were going.”
The Cowboys stifled the first half, holding Clemson to 13 points and opening a 24-point lead before holding back the slow fee to win the school’s first NCAA Tournament victory.
Now, the Wolfpack will have to wait until McNeece’s March Madness Run is over.
And Wade and his players say there’s no problem in focusing on the second round game with Purdue in the meantime.
“Everyone knows everything that’s going on,” MacNeith forwarded Christian Schmate. “Everyone is transparent on both ends, and that’s something to worry about later. We’re focused on winning these games.”
Wade helped LSU play two NCAA tournaments in four years, but was fired in 2021 after being accused of recruiting violations. He took a year off and then signed on with Interstate 10 schools.
“They all-inned our program from the day we got there,” Wade said. “They thought we were a bit quirky when we did it. But hey, who’s laughing now?”
This success revived Wade’s career, where he took a job at the High Profile Atlantic Coast Conference. (Ruth said the school is “far too far” to replace him.) But it also supports the profile of the 6,000-student school, halfway between New Orleans and Houston.
Applications have increased by 10% in the fall, with the yields for students accepting offers rising for the third year in a row, and the school’s website crashed at the final buzzer of Thursday’s game.
“I said, ‘I don’t need a coach. I need someone to understand what our vision is and what our mission is.’ And the coaches are all in on that,” he said.
“We’ve been declining for 14 years and 15 years. We turned it last year, and most of it was a strategic plan to raise the athletic programme to drive academic programs.”
Wade recited the same statistics at a post-game press conference, saying he hopes the team’s insane March run in southwestern Louisiana will have a ripple effect.
Something that won’t disappear when he does.
“This is a big deal for our school,” he said. “In recent weeks, we’ve made a $25 million advertised, we’re going through the roof.”
“This changes our area, five parish regions,” he said. “It changes everything.”
