Report: Bob Huggins to officially enter Naismith Hall of Fame

It felt like a long time coming, but it’s happening. Bob Huggins is going to be a Hall of Famer.

The West Virginia coach is heading to Springfield as part of this year’s Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame class, according to The Athletic and Stadium’s Shams Charania. He just wrapped up his 45th season as a college basketball coach, and his 15th as the head coach at West Virginia.

Huggins started his college playing career at Ohio before transferring to West Virginia after his freshman year. Upon his graduation in 1977, he served as an assistant coach under Joedy Gardner. Then, he joined the Ohio State coaching staff from 1978-80 and got his first head coaching opportunity at Division II Walsh from 1980-83.

UCF brought Huggins aboard as an assistant from 1983-84 before Akron gave him his first D-I coaching job. He led the Zips from 1984-89 before starting a long career at Cincinnati. Huggins coached the Bearcats from 1989-2005 and, after a year at Kansas State from 2006-07, ended up at West Virginia, where he’s been ever since.

Huggins has coached in two Final Fours — with Cincinnati in 1992 and with West Virginia in 2010. He also has three Conference USA Coach of the Year awards and won Big 12 Coach of the Year in 2015. Through his lengthy career as a head coach, Huggins has a 916-399 record, including a 34-25 mark in the NCAA Tournament, and has coached in 12 postseasons.

This past year was a rough go for West Virginia, though. The Mountaineers went 16-17 overall and 4-14 in Big 12 action to miss out on the postseason for the first time since 2013, not counting 2020 when postseason tournaments were canceled due to COVID-19.

Huggins and the rest of the Hall of Famers will be inducted on Sept. 10. Tim Hardaway, Manu Ginobili and George Karl are among the finalists to be inducted in September, according to Charania.