Will Wade is back to being the biggest villain in college basketball. However, if the proposed timeline is true, a new report from CBS Sports proves he technically did not lie to North Carolina State about LSU.
This whole thing came together in less than 48 hours.
Regardless of how you feel about this shocking college basketball shakeup, it is just as much a reflection on the current system of collegiate athletics as it is Wade. Money talks.
Will Wade is back at LSU.
Wade was exiled from the sport of college basketball in 2022 due to a number of recruiting violations that occurred during his five-year stint at LSU. It all came to a head when Federal Bureau of Investigation caught him discussing a “strong a– offer” with a recruit on a wiretap. The conversation was just a small part of a much larger scandal, which was the focus of an HBO documentary called ‘The Scheme.’
Wade was formally fired by the Tigers on March 12, 2022. He was also suspended for the first 10 games of the 2023–24 season and received a two-year show-cause penalty for the “recruiting and bribery violations” he committed in Baton Rouge.
And then the “recruiting and bribery violations” that got him to blackballed at LSU effectively became legal when NIL was introduced on July 1, 2021. That allowed Wade to return to college basketball at McNeese State in 2023.
The Cowboys were one of the best mid-major teams in the country in each of the last two seasons. They went 50-9 en route to back-to-back Southland Conference championships and a first-round win at the NCAA Tournament in 2024-25.
That led North Carolina State to hire Will Wade on March 22, 2025. He signed a six-year deal to be the head coach of the Wolfpack basketball program but he lasted only one season.
Wade bailed on N.C. State for a return to LSU. The move became official on Thursday morning.
He did not lie to North Carolina State.
There were a lot of different factors that went into this decision. NIL backing was the biggest.
The Tigers are willing to give Will Wade more money to build his roster than North Carolina State.
Business is business and a coach must go where he thinks he has the best opportunity to compete for a national championship but the optics of this sudden switcheroo are not great. There is no bigger villain in college basketball.
The bridge was burned. Wade will never be allowed back in Raleigh.
N.C. State athletic director Boo Corrigan spoke with his head basketball coach multiple times over the last few weeks. At no point did he fear of a departure. Wade told him he was not interested in LSU.
“I know the number of times we had conversations about the job, including one time of do we need to talk about this? The answer was no.”
Corrigan claims Wade lied to him as recently as Tuesday. The Wolfpack was completely blindsided.
But here’s the thing. According to a report from Matt Norlander of CBS Sports, this did not come together until Tuesday night.
“Wade was seriously approached Tuesday night by LSU brass about coming back. That’s the origin point and when it became real.”
If that timeline is true, and Wade spoke with Corrigan on Tuesday afternoon, he technically did not lie. Matt McMahon was still in place as the head coach of the Tigers when they spoke. The job at LSU was not yet open. McMahon was not officially fired until after a deal was in place with Wade on Thursday.
Even if they spoke on Tuesday night, Wade only wanted to stay if he could get the guarantees he needed. Corrigan could not give him those guarantees. He didn’t tell the truth but he didn’t lie.
For Wade to tell Corrigan that he wanted to be at North Carolina State makes him look even worse for leaving less than 48 hours later— but there was nothing more for him to say at the time. He did want to be there… until LSU offered him a significant bump in pay for his staff and NIL on Tuesday night.