Report: Assistant Basketball Coach JD Byers Leaving Penn State For Virginia Tech

The JD Byers Era at Penn State is apparently over before it basically started, as the hoops assistant coach is apparently on the move to Virginia Tech, according to Jon Sauber of the Centre Daily Times.

As the tweet shows, there’s some added context with this one: Byers’ wife is the head women’s volleyball coach at Virginia Tech. They have a young daughter, and a second child on the way, so the opportunity to work at the same school as his wife seems like it played a large part in the decision here. And really, who can blame him? Credit to them for even making that work thus far because VCU and Virginia Tech weren’t exactly close to begin with.

As far as Penn State goes, Sauber is reporting that Rhoades is promoting Jimmy Martelli from chief of staff to the vacant assistant coach position. It makes a lot of sense given Rhoades’ background with Martelli, and of course, Martelli’s ties to the Philadelphia recruiting scene.

It should be noted that this is Martelli’s first assistant coaching position since he resigned from Rutgers back in 2013 as part of a player abuse scandal under Mike Rice. Martelli took multiple years off after the incident, but was given a second-chance by Rhoades when he hired him as his chief of staff at VCU. From all reports and accounts over the last six years, there have been zero issues with Martelli since he got back into coaching.