McNeese State coach Will Wade has reached an agreement to be hired as the next coach at North Carolina State, according to multiple reports on Wednesday, returning to the power conference level three years after his tenure at LSU ended with NCAA violations and a show-cause penalty.
Wade is expected to accept his new ACC job after McNeese State’s postseason run is complete. No. 12 seed McNeese faces No. 5 seed Clemson in a Midwest Region first-round game to start the 2025 NCAA Tournament. It’s the second year in a row Wade led the Cowboys to the Southland Conference championship and a spot in March Madness.
Wade, 42, confirmed during a news conference Wednesday in Providence, Rhode Island ahead of McNeese’s game against Clemson that he had spoken with North Carolina State officials since the Wolfpack announced they had fired former coach Kevin Keatts.
Wade had a fast rise up the coaching ladder to start his career, first as an assistant coach at VCU during its Final Four run under Shaka Smart and later as a head coach at Chattanooga, VCU and then LSU. Wade had a 105-51 record over five seasons at LSU, making the NCAA Tournament every year after his opening campaign in 2017-18. The Tigers won the SEC and went to the Sweet 16 under Wade in 2019, but he was suspended for the final five games of the season.
Wade eventually agreed to modifications in his contract and continued as LSU’s coach for three more seasons while an investigation into the program continued. Wade was fired by LSU following the 2021-22 season after the school received a notice of allegations from the NCAA that detailed Wade’s alleged conduct offering financial inducements to players as ‘deliberate and committed after substantial planning.’
After sitting out a season, Wade was hired by McNeese State in March 2023 and retained three months later when he was given a 10-game suspension and two-year show-cause penalty by the NCAA’s now-defunct Independent Accountability Resolution Process. Wade has a 49-8 record during his two seasons at the Lake Charles, Louisiana school.
Keatts led North Carolina State to the Final Four in 2024 after making the NCAA Tournament as one of the final at-large teams. He was rewarded with a contract extension, but the Wolfpack couldn’t follow up that success this season. They finished with a 12-19 record and failed to qualify for the ACC tournament after a 16th-place finish in league play.