Will Wade – A Masterclass in Starting a New Coaching Job

The Will Wade Era Begins

On March 22, 2025 NC State announced the hiring of Will Wade as its newest basketball coach. The transformation of the program since that time has been stunning. The national press has taken notice. Season tickets sales have increased dramatically. Fundraising, for multiple reasons including Coach Wade, is at an all-time high. There is more excitement about the future of the program than there has been since the halcyon days of the Valvano era.

Here We Go!

The first official day of practice is today, Monday September 22.

Coach Wade has been thoughtful, logical, and professional in his approach, every step of the way.

New Coach 101: Introducing a new coach

“There’s going to be a reckoning for the ACC, and a reckoning for college basketball. And it’s coming. And it’s coming soon.” – Will Wade

• Step 1: Make a splash day one (“Not a rebuild”) Promising immediate success, setting the tone
• Step 2: Be transparent with his plans and anticipated schedule. 1. Complete staff. 2. Complete roster. 3. Complete the schedule. All in 6-8 weeks.
• Step 3: MARKETING MATTERS: Make the rounds of interviews locally and nationally. Talk openly and candidly about mistakes made at LSU. Talk about his positive experience at McNeese State. Talk about why NC State was a good fit. Talk about his absolute commitment to NC State – no ambiguity or cute comments about playing Clemson or any divided loyalty. Apologize for marrying a Carolina grad. [okay, that one didn’t really happen]

New Coach 102: Building a coaching staff

“[Coach Howard] has an excellent tactical offensive mind and will do a great job on that side of the court for our team.“ – Will Wade

• Step 1: Retain the coaching staff from McNeese, with one upgrade. He replaced Shawn Forrest with Adam Howard to coach the offense. Howard spent the previous three seasons at Nebraska working for Fred Hoiberg where they made the NCAAT and also averaged more points per game (77.7) than in the previous 29 seasons.
• Step 2: And in a hire that might be the most impactful NC State basketball upgrade, (other than Coach Wade himself) he convinced Andrew Slater to leave his role as an evaluation scout for the NBA Oklahoma Thunder and Patrick Stacey to leave his role as GM at the University of Wyoming to come form the new Wolfpack basketball General Manager team. Their analytical role in identifying and securing talent has been exceptional. They should have a similar impact in scouting opponents.
• Step 3: MARKETING MATTERS: He had the staff do media interviews for the fans to get to know them. And each of them were impressive, promoting the program, the players, and especially Coach Wade.

New Coach 103: Building an entire roster

“We’re only as good as the players. We’ve got everything we need to go and attract the best players in the country” – Will Wade

• Step 1: Evaluate the returning players and recruiting class. Recruit the ones (McNeil & Wilkins) they wanted to keep
• Step 2: Recruit winners out of the transfer portal. Six of nine transfers (Copeland, Breed, Holloman, Williams, Lubin, and Arceneaux) transferred from 2025 NCAA tournament teams. Evan Miyakawa just ranked NC State as having the #3 transfer class in the country.
• Step 3: Recruit top players out of high school. When Matt Able decommitted from Miami due the coaching change, the staff was on him immediately and signed him. He’s the highest ranked Wolfpack recruit who will actually lace up the sneakers since Dennis Smith, Jr. The staff has been very aggressive in getting top-tier 2026 players onsite for official visits and just got a commitment from rising big man Trevon Carter-Givens. There is good reason to be optimistic about the 2026 recruiting class.
• Step 4: Recruit internationally. The staff signed Finnish guard Jayme Kontuniemi and then at the 11th hour, used scholarship #15 on Gambian pro forward Musa Sagnia.
• Step 5: Get results. ESPN just ranked NC State #24 in it’s most recent preseason top 25.
• Steps 6: Team Bonding – The best teams are close knit groups. (best example ever, the ‘23-’24 team) Coach Wade established Boot Camp Week the week of September 15 to challenge them physically and to help them bond through shared misery. A third of the roster, including Sagnia, Kontuniemi, Breed, Ebube, and Wilkins missed some or all of the summer workouts, so this exercise (pun intended) – early in the fall semester – will help accelerate that relationship building. That was followed by a Team Retreat for SEALS training the weekend of the 19th – leading into the start of practice on Monday.
• Step 7: MARKETING MATTERS: In the new world of frequent massive roster turnover, the fans don’t know the players well – especially before the season. To address that, Coach Wade started the ‘Around Raleigh’ regular feature (the link includes links to all episodes to date), in which he interviews individual players giving the fans a chance to get to know them before the season. He’s also recognizing exceptional effort in practice and has established the ‘Wolfpack Standard – Player(s) of the Week’. and publicly announces the winners.

New Coach 104: Building the schedule

“Our time is right now” – Will Wade

• As he said in an early press conference, he is not afraid to schedule anyone. According to KenPom, last season mid-major McNeese State was ranked 25^th in OOC strength of schedule.
• Step 1: Based on Torvik’s preseason rankings, the out of conference schedule will have three guaranteed Q1 games (Auburn, Kansas, Ole Miss) and there is a very good chance of adding two more as part of the Maui Invitational. Potentially FIVE Q1 matchups, and only one of those games, Auburn, will be on the opponent’s court. Plus there are 2 Q2 games.
• Step 1a: He also included three regional teams (NC Central, UNC Greensboro, UNC Asheville) which will probably all be Q4 opponents but will be popular games for the fans and support the smaller NC programs.

New Coach 105: Time to talk about the team as a whole – updates from practice and ramp up to opening night

• Step 1: Some of the players have been working out since May, but as of Sagnia’s arrival, Tuesday September 2 was the first day the full team trained together. The NCAA sanctions practice to officially begin 42 days prior to the first game, that day is Monday September 22. We should start getting updates from team practice soon.
• MARKETING MATTERS – Coach Wade has been really good about publishing updates nearly weekly all summer. (first about himself, then his assistants, then individual players, and most recently team activities) Fans should expect it to continue as formal practice begins and to increase in frequency as the season approaches.
• MARKETING MATTERS – The RED RECKONING – Inspired by the Coach Wade hire, NC State Wolfpack basketball marketing is in high gear. Coach Wade talked about wanting a full house opening night. Those tickets went on sale individually as early as has ever happened and is almost sold out. The local, and Greensboro, non-conference games went on sale before the full schedule was announced. According to AD Corrigan about a month ago, 1,600 more season tickets had been sold this season over last, which is especially notable because last season was coming off of a Final Four run.

WWIAP (P = Professional)

By the calendar, Will Wade is 42 years old, the fourth youngest coach in the ACC. Other than Herb Sendek, who was 33 when hired, he is the youngest Wolfpack coaching hire since Jim Valvano. However, he comes to NC State with 11 total years of head coaching experience at four universities. In the modern era of NC State basketball, since (and including) Everett Case, only Les Robinson (15 seasons) and Mark Gottfried (14) and Norm Sloan (13) have had more experience, and he ranks as tied with BC’s Earl Grant as the seventh most experienced current ACC head coach. He’s won a regular season championship at his last three schools. He’s been the Coach of the Year in two different conferences. In his 11 seasons, he’s taken seven different teams to the NCAA tournament and made it to the Sweet 16. His most losses were 15 in his very first season as a head coach (UT-Chattanooga), and 15 in his first season at LSU. NC State has lost 15 or more games in three of the last four seasons. [Upgrade? Yes!] And, as we all know, he’s had his low moments, but that lesson has been learned.

NC State is benefiting from all of that experience. The Wolfpack has a seasoned, mature coach despite his age. As he told us, “NC State is getting the best Will Wade.” T-shirt time!

WWIAW! Success will come. And watching this chapter of the ‘Will Wade Story’ is going to be a masterclass for all of you future coaches, and a lot of fun for the rest of us. In an interview while at McNeese State earlier this year he told columnist Aaron Torres that he, “hopes his next coaching position will last 10-15 years. ” Coach, we’re all on board with that!