West Virginia swingman Tucker DeVries (12) works against Jonathan Powell during a college basketball practice. (Photo by Kevin Kinder BlueGoldNews.com)
MORGANTOWN — Just as Interstates 79 and 68 merge in Morgantown, sometimes it feels like all roads lead here.
Circumstances have delivered an eclectic group of senior players into the West Virginia University basketball locker room in the Coliseum, forces far out of their own control that led fate to deliver them to Coach Darian DeVries in his first year with the Mountaineers.
They came from near and far, making teammates of Eduardo Andre from London, England, by way of Fresno State, Ofri Naveh from Neot Golan, Israel, and Jayden Stone from Perth, Australia with players from Memphis, Lexington, Kentucky, Chicago and South Bend, Indiana.
They debut Saturday with the first game of their European tour in Italy.
Somehow, though, the most well-known of the players, coach’s son Tucker DeVries, a two-time Missouri Valley Player of the Year at Drake, finds himself with a high school rival in Iowa, and with Toby Okani, a one-time Duquesne player who went head to head with DeVries in a most memorable MVC game while he was at the University of Illinois, Chicago.
It was Drake’s next-to-last regular season game of last season in Chicago, the heavily-favored Bulldogs finding themselves trailing by eight points with nine minutes to play when DeVries led them a late rally that turned it into a 107-104 triple-overtime test of wills.
In the end, DeVries prevailed in what became a 1-on-1 shootout of sorts, DeVries scoring a career-high 39 points with 13 rebounds and 7 assists, and Okani, not necessarily known for his scoring, a career-high 31 points with 12 rebounds and 4 steals.
“We had a heck of a game. We went to triple overtime against each other. That was wild. He had a great game that game,” DeVries recalled after Tuesday’s practice, the two of them now WVU teammates.
Okani is penciled in to be an impact player at WVU this season. He stands 6-8 and is listed as a guard, but his versatility allows him to be a forward as well.
“I would love for Toby to emerge and be that guy where we say, ‘OK, you got him,’ and we could feel good about his ability to shut someone down,” Coach DeVries said. “With his length and versatility and athleticism, he can guard multiple positions. He can guard guards and forwards and switch onto a center. I like what that could look like, because he’s certainly got the tools to do that.”
Okani added a new skill to his game hitting 33 3-point shots last year while averaging 11.1 points and 6.8 rebounds a game at UIC.
Okani has added to the respect Tucker DeVries had for him after that game last season as they’ve begun practicing with and against each other.
“He’s a very versatile defender. He can shoot it, make plays and is a great screener. That’s probably one of the most underrated parts of his game that I’ve noted playing against him,” DeVries said. “He’s a great rebounder. The versatility stands out, being 6-8 but able to move and guard the point guard or the 4, go rebound with the 5’s, he had to switch onto. His (basketball) IQ has really impressed me.”
The younger DeVries had a hand in helping to bring Okani, as well as a number of other players, into Morgantown as the coach’s son and first WVU recruit.
“Early on, when my dad got the job, there wasn’t a big staff in place yet. He knew that I knew some of the guys so he would bounce ideas off me, using my friendship as well,” DeVries said.
“I played against Toby a lot. I kind of knew Joe (Joseph Yesufu, a transfer who played at Drake and then Kansas but is still rehabilitating a hip injury from last year). There were a lot of guys I would reach out to and build that relationship. We didn’t have a roster in place for them to know, so I tried to be that guy they could get comfortable with.”
Tucker DeVries also played a role in bringing invited walk-on Jake Auer onto the roster from Rockhurst College, where he played for four seasons.
Again, it was Tucker DeVries who was key in his recruitment, the two having played at rival high schools in Iowa throughout their prep careers, DeVries at Waukee, Iowa, High and Auer at Valley High in Clive, Iowa.
Asked how they did against each other, DeVries replied:
“The truth? He kicked my butt in high school.”
While that might be something of an exaggeration, the 6-foot, 190-pound Auer was a good high school player who went on to start for three years at Rockford, last season averaging 9.3 points per game, 3.0 rebounds while shooting 42% from the floor and 94% from the free-throw line.
“He’s a great kid,” Tucker DeVries said. “I’m glad he’s here. We were high school rivals and I had a lot of respect for him. We knew of each other, followed each other. He had a great career and when my dad got the job he kind of reached out and said he wanted to change as a senior.”
So, now they pick it up in Morgantown after leaving the rivalry behind in Iowa.
“I asked my Dad and now he’s here. It’s kind of cool how we both end up in the same town and end up in Morgantown, West Virginia,” DeVries said.
As noted, all roads lead to Morgantown.