Anonymous Big 12 coach calls West Virginia the 'worst roster in the league'

West Virginia Mountaineers head coach Neal Brown enters 2023 on the hot seat. This comes amid the Big 12 going through a transition while West Virginia is coming off a 5-7 season.

There are a lot of reasons why West Virginia has struggled recently. However, as one anonymous Big 12 coach told Athlon, a huge part of the problem is that the team’s roster isn’t good enough. In fact, the coach said they’re the worst roster in the league and compared them to a MAC team.

“This might be the worst roster in the league,” the coach said. “They have some talent, but they’re not physical at all. They’re really small, especially compared to the old WVU teams.”

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“The defense is legitimately bad. They look like a MAC team compared to the rest of the league, and he [Neal Brown] didn’t fire his coaches. He’s a really loyal guy, but it’s also a sign he knows it’s a personnel issue.”

Those are bold comments from the anonymous coach, especially with four teams moving up into the conference. However, it goes to show what other coaches in the conference think about what’s going on in Morgantown.

Also interesting is that the coach thinks the issue isn’t that Neal Brown is too loyal to his assistants. It’s that he knows there is a roster issue.

The Mountaineers added 17 players in the transfer portal. However, West Virginia also had 17 players leave for new schools while another five Mountaineers are still looking for a new team in the portal. That’s good for the 51st transfer portal class in the country, according to the On3 Team Transfer Portal Rankings.

Wren Baker is excited about the future in the Big 12

West Virginia athletic director Wren Baker is excited about how Big 12 expansion is going to help West Virginia. This largely comes down to the addition of two AAC schools, Cincinnati and UCF. The Bearcats give West Virginia a regional rival while UCF gives them better access to Florida.

“And I’m excited about that. You look at having Cincinnati in the league, that’s going to create a great rivalry over time, won’t happen overnight. Then at UCF, we have a lot of alums and donors in Florida. So, that’s gonna give us a chance to connect with them. Another Eastern-based team. I’m excited about the future of the Big 12,” Baker said.

“I think we have a chance to, if you just look at this year at all the different sports, I mean OU and Texas are certainly two of the more storied programs, but if you look at the success across the line at a lot of the sports, they did extraordinarily well. So, I think the future of the Big 12 is very bright and very good for WVU.”