WVU Athletics
Reflecting on WV Sports Now’s Most Viewed Stories of 2025
As WV Sports Now closes 2025 and prepares for continued coverage of WVU and West Virginia sports into 2026, it’s time to reflect back on a few stories that caught our readers attention the most throughout the past year.
Below are our top five most read stories of the year. And to no surprise, these stories are a mix of our coverage of the WVU basketball coaching search that led to the hiring of Ross Hodge, the drama of Darian DeVries’ exit, our sourcing that dispelled the false reports about DeVries leaving for Iowa before he eventually left to Indiana and and a popular hometown player leaving the Mountaineers.
At the end of March, WVSN felt comfortable reporting two candidates who were in the running to become WVU’s next head coach. They both did interview and were widely recognized as candidates at one point, but neither ended up with the job. Ben McCollum took the Iowa job and Jerrod Calhoun stayed at Utah State.
(Editor’s note): In the interest of transparency, we were obviously wrong. Wren Baker decided Hodge, who he already had an existing relationship was ready for the jump to the Big 12 and to take over leading an historic program like West Virginia. Unlike the football search, that saw WV Sports Now and several other outlets accurately lead fans through a journey of candidates and the return of Rich Rodriguez, Baker was able to keep Hodge more under wraps until the final days of his search. We learned Baker did not view Calhoun as attractive of an option as fans viewed him and McCollum preferred Iowa due to its proximity, something we did mention was a possibility in our initial reporting.
Next up is one from right before the chaos hit the WVU basketball program. We explained why there was only one reason DeVries would leave West Virginia for Iowa and why he wasn’t going to actually be the next head coach of the Hawkeyes, something fans were assuming was going to happen at the time. We offered why the Iowa job was not a better job in general and some behind the scenes problems going at Iowa.
Right before retreating to focus only on the basketball search, Baker held a press conference to openly discuss DeVries’ departure and what he was looking for in his replacement. During this press conference, Baker was asked about the prospects of bringing back Basketball Hall of Famer Bob Huggins. Baker then gave an answer that made it clear he has completely turned the page from Huggins and the Mountaineer legend would not be returning for a second tenure.
Former WVU head coach Bob Huggins in the middle of a game in January, 2023. (WVSN photo by Kelsie LeRose)
The stench of DeVries’ exit reeked so much that it sparked a big reaction from current (at that time) and former players, who couldn’t hold back their frustration and displeasure with this actions of the ex West Virginia coach, who used his lone season in Morgantown to land a position he viewed as a step up in college basketball. This all went down soon after DeVries’ Mountaineers were snubbed from an NCAA Tournament bid despite a 19-win season that included six Quad 1 wins and three wins over teams ranked inside the top 10.
And even though, and as expected, the basketball search led the way for the year, a football story did crack into the top five. Hudson Clement, a player who went from local walk-on to overnight sensation, decided to take his talents to Illinois and not continue his career as a Mountaineer. Instead of watching the West Virginia native transition from Neal Brown to Rodriguez, WVU fans were forced to watch one of their own move to the Big Ten.
WVU wide receiver Hudson Clement on the field during the 2024 Backyard Brawl against Pitt at Acrisure Stadium in Pittsburgh. (WVSN photo by Kelsie LeRose)
Aware of the venom fans were hurling his way, Clement clapped back with his side of the story and clarified some false narratives of what went down.
Clement’s production did drop with Illinois. He caught only 33 balls for 406 yards and scored three touchdowns, a far cry from the 51 receptions for 741 yards and five scores he recorded in 2024 with WVU.
Note: These aren’t the only stories who performed well on the site, but just the ones who popped the most. A major coaching search and drama, especially when the coaching search has tons of drama, is going to generate big numbers. This was also evident during every other past search from recent years and why WV Sports Now has been drawing millions upon millions of readers for several years in a row.
