The Teays River /ˈteɪz/(pronounced taze) was a major preglacial river that drained much of the present Ohio River watershed, but took a more northerly downstream course. Traces of the Teays across northern Ohio and Indiana are represented by a network of river valleys. The largest still existing contributor to the former Teays River is the Kanawha River in West Virginia, which is itself an extension of the New River.The name "Teays," from the much smaller Teays Valley still extant above the surface, has been associated with the river and the remainder of its related buried valley since 1910. The more appropriate name would be ancestral Kanawha Valley. The term Teays is used when discussing the buried portion of the ancestral Kanawha River.The Teays was comparable in size to the Ohio River.