National WBB writer thinks Virginia Tech hiring Megan Duffy is "pretty impressive"

You can't say that Virginia Tech athletic director Whit Babcock didn't do his homework. Seven days after he met with the media following Kenny Brooks departing Blacksburg for Kentucky to take over as the women's basketball coach, Babcock announced his replacement Wednesday morning.

Babcock hired Marquette coach Megan Duffy and one look at her résumé shows that she had plenty of success at her two previous stops, Miami of Ohio and Marquette. Virginia Tech fans are hoping she can have the same success in Blacksburg and the ACC that she had in the Big East in her time in Milwaukee.

National women's basketball writer Chantel Jennings of The Athletic thinks that the hiring by Babcock of Duffy was "pretty impressive.'' Here is what she wrote.

"Pretty impressive. There are plenty of folks in the industry who are waiting to see how much of Virginia Tech’s success is going to be sustainable moving forward, because so much of it was built by this recent grouping of Kitley, Cayla King and Amoore. However, what that group and a Final Four run built as a potential foundation in Blacksburg is undeniable. Because of what they did, there’s now a very engaged fanbase that is eager to support the Hokies."

- Chantel Jennings

To think that the success that Brooks, Georgia Amoore, Cayla King and Elizabeth Kitley had is going to happen again in 2024-25 is somewhat unrealistic, but they are not going into a full-blown rebuild under Duffy. Carleigh Wenzel announced Wednesday night that she is returning to play under Duffy and there are still other players that will have to decide on where to play next winter.

Duffy will likely look to the transfer portal to make roster additions and some of those additions might come from her roster this past season at Marquette where some of the players she had have entered the portal. Who knows, maybe some of her recruits will follow her to Virginia Tech as well. Regardless, this at first look appears to be a very good hiring by Babcock to replace Brooks and keep the Hokies more than competitive in the ACC going forward.