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Hokies AD Jim Weaver addressed the hiring of Kevin Dresser in an informal gathering with media members Friday afternoon:

Q: After the turmoil of the past week, do you feel like you have your man?

I don’t feel like we have him; we do have him. He’s right over there. We’re very pleased and proud to announce that Kevin Dresser is our new head wrestling coach here at Virginia Tech. He’s had a career of success wherever he’s been and whatever he’s done – all the way back to when he was an individual national champion on the collegiate level at the University of Iowa [and as] part of that coaching staff as a … grad assistant for a year or two, and then at Grundy and at Christiansburg High School. I think he has a real good knack of being able to develop wrestlers. I think that’s a trait we need to have in our head coach.

Q: Is it important to have a local guy?

Having someone from the local area … I think what this is going to mean for us is that we’re not going to have to be out looking for a wrestling coach every couple of years. He’s been in this area for some time, likes Southwest Virginia, and I think that’s important to the continuity that we want to create in our wrestling program. We made a very strong commitment when we hired Coach Brands two years ago. That very same commitment in still in progress and we intend to continue on that same road.

Q: Did the departure of Tom Brands after only two seasons make it even more important that you hire someone now who will stick around longer?

Not necessarily any more or any less. It’s hard to put percentages on things. But normally what we do as a senior athletic administrative staff is just take a look at the environment – and that’s what we needed to do when we put out the release that said we needed to reflect on the future direction and leadership of the program. We just hired a guy two years ago and now we’re back hiring again. That’s not something you like to do a lot. It doesn’t help the continuity with the young people. It doesn’t help the continuity internally, and it raises questions. Well, also people need to understand that we just can’t go as quickly as they think we need to go. We have certain processes and procedures that need to be followed. As the director of athletics, I report directly to the [university] president and I have to communicate with him and he happened to be out of the country. It takes a little time to get everything in order and get it all worked out. Quite honestly, I’m very pleased that we’ve been able to move as quickly as we have, because a lot of young guys in our program and young people out there are wondering what’s going to happen and what direction are we going and who’s going to be the leader. Now that’s over, and I think that’s really, really important for the future of our program.

Q: Did Kevin come to mind quickly when Tom left?

We’ve known about Kevin for a long time. Kevin looked at my house when I was selling my Greenbriar house about six or seven years ago, so I’ve known of Kevin. And followed his career and know how good he’s been at Christiansburg High School.

Q: Did you talk with Jim Zalesky or any other candidates?

We did.

Q: In your initial conversations with Kevin about Tech wrestling, was he coming to you as a candidate for the job or just as a friend of the program concerned about its future?

How the dialogue unfolded isn’t an important issue. What’s important is the end result, and the fact that he’s our new coach and the direction is determined. We believe we’re going to have a lot of continuity for the years to come, which we think is very important for the young people who are in our program, for the young people we’ve signed, for the young people who we’re going to recruit in the future.

Q: Have any of the current wrestlers asked to be released from their commitments to Tech? How will you proceed on that issue?

We’ll deal with that next week. This is Kevin’s Good Friday and I’m not going to spoil it with any other topics. We’ll deal with those topics next week. We’ll meet with our wrestling squad on Monday, as we told them nine or 10 days ago we would meet on Monday the 17th. Four or five of them are out in Las Vegas at a tournament and aren’t available. I know Kevin’s called some of the current guys to make them aware, which we planned out earlier today that we wanted to do so that they would hear it from him before they read it in the newspaper.

Q: Will Kevin have all the resources you had been planning to give Brands?

Nothing’s changed. The monetary involvement is the same. I mean, we’ve made a great step forward and those steps are still in place. Let me say this: We believe wrestling can be an impact sport in the Atlantic Coast Conference for Virginia Tech, and that’s very important to this university and its constituency.

[pause]

Man, that must have been a quotable line. Everybody’s writing like heck.

Q: Looking back at Brands’s tenure, is the program farther ahead than it was two years ago?

Oh, I think the wrestling program has grown, yes.

Q: How much more can it grow?

We ultimately want to be very competitive on the national scene. Let me give you an example, but don’t misquote me on this: I used to work at Clarion University in Pennsylvania, which is in the Eastern Wrestling League – and it’s also in the same conference, the Pennsylvania State [Athletic] Conference, with Edinboro and Bloomsburg and Lock Haven and Slippery Rock – all institutions that have been top-15, top-10 programs in Division I. When I was there, [National Wrestling Hall of Famer] Bob Bubb had the program there. Edinboro this past year was eighth, I think, in the NCAA nationals. If those people, with those environments and facilities and those institutions can be there, then with us being in the Atlantic Coast Conference at Virginia Tech, with our commitment and our facilities and our new head coach and the quality staff he’ll hire, and the fact that we’re within the very best recruiting area in America – New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia – we’ve got a golden opportunity to be very successful. But we’ve got to walk before we run. We want to be competitive and have an impact on the Atlantic Coast Conference, and that will [translate] in a natural fashion to being competitive on the national scene, in my opinion.

(We'll have Dresser's comments soon.)