Photo by: WVU Athletic Communications
WVU’s Baker Remains Bullish on Mountaineer Athletics
May 19, 2026 07:57 PM | General
MORGANTOWN, W.VA. – Another successful athletic year is nearing its conclusion, which means it's time for West Virginia University Vice President and Director of Athletics Wren Baker to put a bow on things with his yearly spring visit with media.
The AD began the hour-long session inside the Milan Puskar Center Team Room earlier today by reading off a lengthy list of accomplishments his department has achieved so far this year with a handful of spring sports still in competition, including the No. 11-ranked Mountaineer baseball team playing in this week's Big 12 Tournament at Surprise Stadium in Surprise, Arizona.
Steve Sabins' squad achieved a school-record 21 regular season conference wins and is looking to sweeten its NCAA Tournament hosting credentials when the field is revealed next Monday.
If baseball can secure one of the 16 host sites, that will make a school-best four NCAA Tournament regionals coming to Morgantown, West Virginia, during the academic calendar year. The others were men's and women's soccer, as well as women's basketball earlier this spring.
"I've talked to you in the past about how important I believe it is for us to bring dollars into our city, community and state, and also to promote tourism throughout the state, which I've been a big proponent of what a great place this is to come to vacation and spend time," Baker remarked. "We've hosted three NCAA Tournament regionals, and we're hoping to add a fourth to that.
"That brings a lot of people into the city; it fills hotel rooms and restaurants, so those are all good things for the local and state economy," he said.
Speaking of women's basketball, the Mountaineers joined national champion rifle as the school's two conference tournament championship teams so far in 2026. Coach Mark Kellogg's Mountaineers were a 12-foot jumper away from reaching the NCAA Tournament "Sweet 16" in front of a sold-out Hope Coliseum crowd, and his transfer portal haul includes a pair of top 25 players in Marquette's Skylar Forbes and George Mason's Zahirah Walton.
West Virginia is currently fourth in the Big 12 in the Directors' Cup standings and 34th overall nationally.
"For our athletic year to date, we've had a ton of really strong accomplishments by our teams. We've had eight NCAA team qualifiers, two conference championships, seven All-Americans, 25 all-conference selections, 10 individual NCAA qualifiers and as you know, we are still playing here," Baker said. "We have some teams that we hope will continue to notch some accomplishments.
"That speaks to the success that our teams are having," he says of his department's current position in the Directors' Cup standings, adding that he's also pleased with the overall academic accomplishments of WVU's student-athletes with their 991 (academic progress rate score) matching its all-time high.
He mentioned the role Gold & Blue Enterprises, overseen by Don Robinson, has played in enhancing WVU's competitive edge and helping provide the fuel for the department's success.
"Don Robinson continues to build a team and to build that organization out and they're doing a lot to help promote NIL and give opportunities to our student-athletes to grow their commercial revenue and that continues to be a focus of ours," Baker opined.
Concerning capital projects, the premium seating initiative at Hope Coliseum is currently underway and the quiet fundraising phase for the anticipated $150 million Milan Puskar Stadium West Press Box Tower renovation project is nearing its conclusion. Baker said he anticipates announcing some updates on that project later this summer with the goal of starting it at the conclusion of the 2026 football season with a completion date arriving sometime in 2028.
"You have seen renderings and some information on the West Press Box Tower project and that is going very well," Baker said. "If all goes well, that project will be completed and open in time for the 2028 football season. We feel pretty good about that."
The athletic department's budget has grown significantly over the last two years and will exceed $150 million this year, according to Baker, which now puts the Mountaineers in the upper half of the Big 12.
When Baker assumed the department leadership role in the fall of 2022, WVU's department was near the bottom of the conference, which included the league's newest additions BYU, UCF, Cincinnati and Houston.
"For about a decade, our overall budget was fairly static, grew some, and then regressed some during COVID, but it did not grow at the clip that we really needed it to," Baker conceded. "This year's and next year's budget will exceed $150 million total, which is roughly 50% growth from where we were three years ago. It's taken a lot of people to do that, and a lot of people from home have contributed to that."
He said the Mountaineer Athletic Club recently hit the 7,000-mark in total donors with the goal of exceeding 8,000 this year, which would represent an all-time high. The unit is also expected to establish a record for overall fundraising that was set in 2009.
"We are in the middle of a Membership Matters campaign and we're going to need your help to do it from the people at home," Baker said. "So, get your neighbor, your friend or the person who sits by you at church or with you at your kid's game this summer to join the MAC because it's really important."
Baker mentioned the role a supportive Board of Governors and WVU President Michael T. Benson have played in the department's overall success this year and he's confident that success will continue under the leadership of Benson and Board of Governors chair Rusty Hutson Jr.
As far as the two revenue sports, football and men's basketball, Baker believes West Virginia has successfully navigated what he terms "transitional periods" with those two programs and remains bullish on their futures.
Native son, Rich Rodriguez, recently completed one of the best recruiting years in school history, stockpiling football's roster with talented high school, junior college and transfer portal players. Baker credits Rodriguez's willingness to bank some of his NIL dollars last year to put the program in position to have the recruiting success that it has enjoyed this winter.
Men's basketball's Ross Hodge - the program's fourth coach in four years - had basically a month to assemble a roster of players that eventually put West Virginia in contention for an NCAA Tournament bid before ending the season with 21 victories and two exciting, come-from-behind wins over Stanford and Oklahoma to claim the eight-team College Basketball Crown in Las Vegas.
Hodge, like Rodriguez, has assembled a terrific recruiting class which includes national top 25 prep performer Miles Sadler of Bella Vista Prep in Scottsdale, Arizona, and an impressive transfer portal group highlighted by Georgia Tech forward Mouhamed Sylla, Butler guard Finley Bizjack, and former five-star prospect Jason Sanon, who played last year at St. John's.
"Every time you transition head coaches in football and men's basketball, you are going to completely flip that roster and we've seen that," Baker pointed out. "You bring people in and they miss the high school recruiting cycle entirely and they were having to get everybody from the portal and the price in the portal, especially the later you go, the lesser the return is, I would say."
Considering the unsettling situation that continues to exist in collegiate athletics with no guardrails on spending, Baker remains committed to steering West Virginia University through these unsettling waters.
"This is not a West Virginia problem. This is national, and we have been able to find a way to better-position ourselves in each of the last three or four years, and I think going into this year, this is probably the best we've ever felt in terms of the resources and where our teams rank inside the Big 12," he concluded.
The AD began the hour-long session inside the Milan Puskar Center Team Room earlier today by reading off a lengthy list of accomplishments his department has achieved so far this year with a handful of spring sports still in competition, including the No. 11-ranked Mountaineer baseball team playing in this week's Big 12 Tournament at Surprise Stadium in Surprise, Arizona.
Steve Sabins' squad achieved a school-record 21 regular season conference wins and is looking to sweeten its NCAA Tournament hosting credentials when the field is revealed next Monday.
If baseball can secure one of the 16 host sites, that will make a school-best four NCAA Tournament regionals coming to Morgantown, West Virginia, during the academic calendar year. The others were men's and women's soccer, as well as women's basketball earlier this spring.
"I've talked to you in the past about how important I believe it is for us to bring dollars into our city, community and state, and also to promote tourism throughout the state, which I've been a big proponent of what a great place this is to come to vacation and spend time," Baker remarked. "We've hosted three NCAA Tournament regionals, and we're hoping to add a fourth to that.
"That brings a lot of people into the city; it fills hotel rooms and restaurants, so those are all good things for the local and state economy," he said.
Speaking of women's basketball, the Mountaineers joined national champion rifle as the school's two conference tournament championship teams so far in 2026. Coach Mark Kellogg's Mountaineers were a 12-foot jumper away from reaching the NCAA Tournament "Sweet 16" in front of a sold-out Hope Coliseum crowd, and his transfer portal haul includes a pair of top 25 players in Marquette's Skylar Forbes and George Mason's Zahirah Walton.
West Virginia is currently fourth in the Big 12 in the Directors' Cup standings and 34th overall nationally.
"For our athletic year to date, we've had a ton of really strong accomplishments by our teams. We've had eight NCAA team qualifiers, two conference championships, seven All-Americans, 25 all-conference selections, 10 individual NCAA qualifiers and as you know, we are still playing here," Baker said. "We have some teams that we hope will continue to notch some accomplishments.
"That speaks to the success that our teams are having," he says of his department's current position in the Directors' Cup standings, adding that he's also pleased with the overall academic accomplishments of WVU's student-athletes with their 991 (academic progress rate score) matching its all-time high.
He mentioned the role Gold & Blue Enterprises, overseen by Don Robinson, has played in enhancing WVU's competitive edge and helping provide the fuel for the department's success.
"Don Robinson continues to build a team and to build that organization out and they're doing a lot to help promote NIL and give opportunities to our student-athletes to grow their commercial revenue and that continues to be a focus of ours," Baker opined.
Concerning capital projects, the premium seating initiative at Hope Coliseum is currently underway and the quiet fundraising phase for the anticipated $150 million Milan Puskar Stadium West Press Box Tower renovation project is nearing its conclusion. Baker said he anticipates announcing some updates on that project later this summer with the goal of starting it at the conclusion of the 2026 football season with a completion date arriving sometime in 2028.
"You have seen renderings and some information on the West Press Box Tower project and that is going very well," Baker said. "If all goes well, that project will be completed and open in time for the 2028 football season. We feel pretty good about that."
The athletic department's budget has grown significantly over the last two years and will exceed $150 million this year, according to Baker, which now puts the Mountaineers in the upper half of the Big 12.
When Baker assumed the department leadership role in the fall of 2022, WVU's department was near the bottom of the conference, which included the league's newest additions BYU, UCF, Cincinnati and Houston.
"For about a decade, our overall budget was fairly static, grew some, and then regressed some during COVID, but it did not grow at the clip that we really needed it to," Baker conceded. "This year's and next year's budget will exceed $150 million total, which is roughly 50% growth from where we were three years ago. It's taken a lot of people to do that, and a lot of people from home have contributed to that."
He said the Mountaineer Athletic Club recently hit the 7,000-mark in total donors with the goal of exceeding 8,000 this year, which would represent an all-time high. The unit is also expected to establish a record for overall fundraising that was set in 2009.
"We are in the middle of a Membership Matters campaign and we're going to need your help to do it from the people at home," Baker said. "So, get your neighbor, your friend or the person who sits by you at church or with you at your kid's game this summer to join the MAC because it's really important."
Baker mentioned the role a supportive Board of Governors and WVU President Michael T. Benson have played in the department's overall success this year and he's confident that success will continue under the leadership of Benson and Board of Governors chair Rusty Hutson Jr.
As far as the two revenue sports, football and men's basketball, Baker believes West Virginia has successfully navigated what he terms "transitional periods" with those two programs and remains bullish on their futures.
Native son, Rich Rodriguez, recently completed one of the best recruiting years in school history, stockpiling football's roster with talented high school, junior college and transfer portal players. Baker credits Rodriguez's willingness to bank some of his NIL dollars last year to put the program in position to have the recruiting success that it has enjoyed this winter.
Men's basketball's Ross Hodge - the program's fourth coach in four years - had basically a month to assemble a roster of players that eventually put West Virginia in contention for an NCAA Tournament bid before ending the season with 21 victories and two exciting, come-from-behind wins over Stanford and Oklahoma to claim the eight-team College Basketball Crown in Las Vegas.
Hodge, like Rodriguez, has assembled a terrific recruiting class which includes national top 25 prep performer Miles Sadler of Bella Vista Prep in Scottsdale, Arizona, and an impressive transfer portal group highlighted by Georgia Tech forward Mouhamed Sylla, Butler guard Finley Bizjack, and former five-star prospect Jason Sanon, who played last year at St. John's.
"Every time you transition head coaches in football and men's basketball, you are going to completely flip that roster and we've seen that," Baker pointed out. "You bring people in and they miss the high school recruiting cycle entirely and they were having to get everybody from the portal and the price in the portal, especially the later you go, the lesser the return is, I would say."
Considering the unsettling situation that continues to exist in collegiate athletics with no guardrails on spending, Baker remains committed to steering West Virginia University through these unsettling waters.
"This is not a West Virginia problem. This is national, and we have been able to find a way to better-position ourselves in each of the last three or four years, and I think going into this year, this is probably the best we've ever felt in terms of the resources and where our teams rank inside the Big 12," he concluded.
Wren Baker | May 19
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