MORGANTOWN, W.VA. ? Spurned by Bob Huggins and others, West Virginia hired Bowling Green’s Dan Dakich as its head coach Thursday.

Dakich played at Indiana and was an assistant to Bob Knight for 11 years there. At West Virginia, he’ll try to rebuild a team that set records for losses in two of the past four seasons and was racked with discipline problems.

The Mountaineers were 8-20 this season, 1-15 in the Big East.

“What’s happened in the past has happened in the past. It’s where you want to go, how hard you want to work that is going to determine how far we get to,” Dakich said. “You can rest assured, we are used to absolutely nothing but players’ best effort, not only on the court, in the classroom.”

Dakich agreed to a five-year, $2.5 million contract. He replaces Gale Catlett, who retired in February after 24 seasons with the Mountaineers and a school-record 565 wins.

Dakich was 89-57 in five seasons at Bowling Green, without a trip to the NCAA tournament. The Falcons went 24-9 this season the school’s most victories in more than half a century and played in the NIT for the second time in three years.

“There are some guys here who can play a little bit,” Dakich said. “I want to see what their interest is in turning this into something special. we’re going to work like crazy. We’re going to treat kids right.”