The clock officially hit midnight for the Cinderella McNeese State basketball program, which was bounced out of March Madness in the second round with a 76-62 loss to Purdue. After the game, head coach Will Wade—who is expected to take the NC State job for next season— was all about being grateful to McNeese State, the team that gave him another head coaching job when no one else would.
“I’m a believer in second chances. A lot of people in our program are second chances, myself, the players. That’s kind of why we’re close,” Wade said after the game, per reporter Brian Murphy. “So I’m a big believer in it, and hopefully, we did right by the people who gave us a second chance.”
He also addressed the elephant in the room, that the McNeese State loss to Purdue in March Madness would be the last time he will coach the Louisiana-based basketball program.
“I’ll worry about that tomorrow. Look, I’m an honest guy but today I want to put a bow on everything with McNeese if we can. That’ll be up to whatever else happens. Now I want to worry about McNeese,” Wade said when asked about the NC State job, according to another Murphy tweet.
In 2017, Will Wade was a rising college basketball coaching star after successful stops at UT-Chatanooga and VCU landed him the LSU job. However, the coach was soon caught up in a recruiting violation and bribery scandal in which the FBI got involved. While Wade ultimately avoided legal charges, he ended up without a job after the NCAA slapped him with a 10-game suspension and a two-year show-cause penalty at the end of the 2020-21 season.
After sitting out his two seasons, McNeese State came calling, and Wade got another job in college basketball. In the last two seasons, Wade has a 50-9 record (36-2 in the Southland Conference) and has made two NCAA Tournament appearances, this year upsetting Clemson in Round 1.
Like almost all college basketball coaches, Wade will now jump ship for the next job up the ladder and move to the ACC. He does, however, sound truly grateful for what McNeese State did for him, although not grateful enough to stay and build the program.
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