Hodge Announces Phil Specialty to Guys’s Basketball Personnel
MORGANTOWN, W.Va.– West Virginia University men’s basketball coach Ross Hodge has actually revealed the hiring of Phil Strength as an assistant coach.Forte, a local of Flower Mound, Texas, spent the last 2 seasons as an assistant coach at North Texas. Forte has eight seasons of Division I coaching experience.
“Phil is one of the very best young coaches in the nation,” Hodge stated. “The work principles and character that helped him be a terrific player in the Huge 12 has brought into his training profession. He has a terrific understanding of how to help our players to improve on and off the flooring. We are happy to have Phil and Madison in Morgantown.”
This previous season at North Texas, the Mean Green won 27 games and advanced to the semifinals of NIT. The Mean Green ranked 3rd in the country in scoring defense at 60.1 points per game, 1.5 points behind first-place Houston. UNT had the AAC’s second-most effective offense and second-most efficient defense. UNT’s 27 wins were the second-most single season wins in school history and the 14 league victories were connected for the third-most league wins in school history.UNT won 19 games in
his first season in 2023-24 and reached the 2nd round of the NIT. The 10 league wins and.555 league winning portion were both the very best by a first-year UNT males’s basketball staff. Strength hired a few of North Texas ‘leading entertainers and helped mentor guard Jason Edwards to first-team all-conference honors. UNT won 46 games in Forte’s two seasons in Denton. “I’m delighted to get to work here in Morgantown,
“Strength stated.” I am extremely fortunate to continue to work for a coach and individual like Ross Hodge. West Virginia basketball remains in fantastic hands with him leading the program.”Prior to North Texas, Forte spent two seasons at Saint Louis under Travis
Ford. He helped lead the Billikens to back-to-back 20-win seasons and a combined 44-24 record. SLU reached the semifinals of the 2022 A-10 Tournament and made an NIT quote that year as well. Saint Louis ’23 wins that year connected for its most single-season wins given that 2013-14. Prior to his two seasons at Saint Louis, Strength was an assistant coach at Sam Houston under Jason Hooten.
Sam Houston went 37-22 in Forte’s two seasons there.During his time as a coach, Specialty has actually helped 10 different players to 13 all-conference honors, consisting of five honorees this previous season at North Texas and 2021 Southland Conference Player of the Year Zach Nutall at Sam Houston and back-to-back A-10 First Team All-Conference honoree Yuri Collins at Saint Louis.Forte played at Oklahoma State from 2012-17 and was among the Cowboys’ most embellished guards in program history. He led OSU to four NCAA tournament looks. He made an OSU record
329 3-point field goals and scored 1,792 career points, which ranked sixth in school history at the time of his graduation.Forte finished from Marcus High School in 2012 and was a two-time state champ. He was the MVP of the 2012 Texas Class 5A State Competition after scoring a game-high 24 points in the national championship and also
earned first team all-state honors.