Report: Battle, Edwards, Perez Waiting Until New Coach is Hired to Decide on WVU

It was first reported by Jake Weingarten of Stockrisers that West Virginia basketball players RaeQuan Battle, Jesse Edwards and Jose Perez are waiting until a new coach is hired to decide on whether or not to stay. WVU has lost three players to the transfer portal with Tre Mitchell (F), Kerr Kriisa (G) and Joe Toussaint (G) over the past 24 hours.

Battle (Montana State – 17.7 ppg), Edwards (Syracuse – 14.5 ppg, 10.3 rpg, 2.7 bpg) and Perez (Manhattan – 18.9 ppg) all have not played a single game at West Virginia but are all talented incoming transfers.

It is reported that the players want to retain assistants Josh Eilert and DerMarr Johnson, as well as director of recruiting Jay Kuntz. Eilert and Johnson are both new in their assistant roles while Kuntz has taken the reins of recruiting over the past year. Kuntz has been a huge part in bringing in the past two transfer portal classes, which were both regarded top-5 in their respective classes according to EvanMiya.

West Virginia has begun conducting discussions over Zoom, first with UAB’s Andy Kennedy. Other mid-major coaches are involved in talks but it’s unknown which coaches exactly.

West Virginia currently has 10 players on the roster with four transfer portal additions and six returning players as of Friday. WVU returns Josiah Harris (F), Kobe Johnson (G), James Okonkwo (F), Patrick Suemnick (F), Mohamed Wague (F), Seth Wilson (G) while transfers RaeQuan Battle (G – Montana State), Jesse Edwards (C – Syracuse), Jose Perez (G – Manhattan) and Omar Silverio (G – Manhattan) are on campus.

WV Sports Now will keep you up to date on the latest with the coaching search as well as the potential departures.