Tom Crean’s arrival as IU basketball’s new coach will probably result in more than just a change in the head coaching position. It is likely that Crean will assemble a new coaching staff minus at least two decorated assistant coaches from this year.
McCallum is one Hoosier assistant who's looking to be a head coach
One of those assistant coaches is of course Dan Dakich, who served as interim head coach between former coach Kelvin Sampson’s abrupt departure and the recent hiring of Crean from Marquette. Dakich told the
Indy Star that he’d “like to be a head coach, at the Division level preferably,” so there’s no doubt that he’ll be eyeing any coaching vacancies in the near future. Dakich was successful as the head coach for 10 years of Bowling Green, and was favored by many to succeed Sampson permanently prior to Crean’s hiring.
The Hoosiers’ performed poorly under his direction, but to his credit the job came in the midst of very unfavorable circumstances. He has a definite chance to still score a good gig with his established pedigree and his unquestionable potential. Many wouldn’t mind seeing him hit the road, but it never hurts to have a head coach-caliber guy on the bench as an assistant.
Another great assistant coach who may be moving up the ladder is Ray McCallum. Earlier this year the players campaigned for McCallum to get the interim coaching job. He came to IU with Sampson and was previously a head coach for Ball State and Houston. Like Dakich, McCallum has the requisite experience to be a candidate for a head coaching position, and would almost surely jump at the chance to lead a program.
The last holdover is assistant coach Jeff Myers, who has over 30 years of experience coaching at almost every level. It is not known whether he will actively pursue another job.
Although Dakich speculated that “my guess would be that Tom has the guys in place that he would want,” Crean hasn’t closed the door on the issue just yet. He plans to meet with the current staff soon, and stated that he wanted a staff formed this week. He acknowledged that he needs to “sort out” things with his staff from Marquette, a gifted pool from which he will likely draw first.
Possible candidates from Marquette include assistant coaches Tim Buckley, Bennie Seltzer, and Buzz Williams, each of whom have varying specialties.
Buckley, who has the most head coaching experience of the trio, spent six seasons as head coach for Ball State before working as an assistant coach for Steve Alford at Iowa and then coming to Marquette this year.
Seltzer excels in player development, and served as a court coach in the 2004 USA Basketball national team trials. Coincidentally, Seltzer was an assistant coach under Kelvin Sampson at Oklahoma for nine seasons before moving to Marquette.
Williams is a recruiting stud who worked as recruiting coordinator at Texas A&M for two season, garnering nationally-ranked recruiting classes before getting a head coaching job at the University of New Orleans for one year and then coming to Marquette. Williams recruited a number of conference Freshman of the Year honorees in previous positions at Texas-Arlington, Texas A&M-Kingsville, and Northwestern State.
With so much talent to work with, Crean should have no problem putting together a great coaching staff. Even though IU may lose two good coaches in Dakich and McCallum, they should see opportunities for head coaching gigs pop up, and there are plenty of qualified individuals ready to step into their role.
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