Indiana Basketball: Tom Crean solidifies tenure with Hoosiers

Love him or hate him, clinching the Big Ten Regular Season Championship in a tough road win at Iowa finally solidifies Tom Crean’s tenure at Indiana

Tom Crean is finally out of debt.

This debt isn’t a financial one, but rather one based in other things, both tangible and intangible. Since taking over a head coaching position he called his “dream job” in 2008, Crean has been in a deficit of sorts.

The deficit began with three straight losing seasons, something Indiana hadn’t experienced from a head coach since Lou Watson from 1967-70. During this time, Crean was given mostly a wide berth, largely due to the state in which the program was left by the dismissed Kelvin Sampson, which left him with virtually no players. Even though Crean was always seen as a good recruiter, his plan was spotty at best.

By Crean’s fourth season in 2011-12, he finally had a marquee player in Cody Zeller and a solid, healthy lineup that included Victor Oladipo and Christian Watford. Hoosier fans and alumni were starting to get restless with a once elite program being viewed as a massive reclamation project.

However this did not deter Crean from doing what he did from day one in Bloomington, selling the hopes and dreams of a return to greatness that brought with it a tinge of used car salesman, if we’re being honest.

For all his evangelistic fervor about the “good old days” for Indiana basketball, not much of it showed on the court as the team set up and knocked down a relatively creampuff pre-Big Ten schedule (something that hasn’t much changed).

That is until Kentucky came to visit.

When the #1 ranked Wildcats lost to the Hoosiers thanks to a buzzer beater three-point shot by Christian Watford, fans finally felt that Indiana turned the corner back towards those salad days that Crean harkened back to so fervently.

Even though Kentucky would get their revenge in the NCAA Tournament by knocking off the Hoosiers in the Sweet 16, year four for Crean looked like he was fulfilling the promise.

But he was still in basketball debt.

With the Hoosiers spending a good portion of the 2012-13 season in the top 10 behind the dominant play of Zeller and Oladipo, the Hoosiers were expected to go back to the Final Four for the first time since Mike Davis took them on a surprise run in 2002.

Rumors circulated daily as to whether or not Crean would be fired, how much would the buyout cost the university, and would Brad Stevens leave the Boston Celtics to take the job.

The regular season closed with a Big Ten title, Indiana’s first outright championship since 1993, and everything was looking up – that is until the #1 seeded Hoosiers fell to the 2-3 zone of the Syracuse Orange in their second straight Sweet 16 loss.

While the first loss was an encouraging sign of growth, this time around questions about Crean’s ability to lead started creeping in. Add to that news that Crean handed out Sweet 16 commemorative rings to the team, and the fanbase began to turn on him.

With both Oladipo and Zeller leaving for the NBA, Crean was left with an extremely young team consisting of his much-hyped “Movement” which included sophomores Kevin “Yogi” Ferrell, Hanner Mosquera-Perea, Peter Jurkin and Jeremy Hollowell.

Of the so-called “Movement”, Mosquera-Perea and Jurkin barely saw playing time and Hollowell was a constant discipline problem. Only Ferrell showed any level of promise that lived up to the hype. As a result, the Hoosiers went from having a 29-7 record to a disappointing 17-15.

And then the problems began.

As the 2013-14 season was unravelling on the court, Mosquera-Perea was arrested for DUI after being picked up for hitting a curb near the IU campus. Crean suspended Perea was suspended for two games, but it was only the beginning.

Mosquera-Perea’s February 2014 arrest heralded a number of incidents where players seemed out of control under Crean’s watch.

April 14, 2014: starting junior point guard Kevin “Yogi” Ferrell and now former guard Stanford Robinson were arrested for underage drinking and being in possession of fake IDs.

November 3, 2014: Moments after being dropped off by freshman teammate Emmitt Holt, Devin Davis was struck Holt right in front of Memorial Stadium. Davis suffered a severe head injury; Holt was cited for underage drinking and operating a vehicle with a blood-alcohol content above .02. after he registered a BAC of .025.

May 14, 2015: Davis, who was still recovering from his head injury, and Mosquera-Perea were dismissed from the team after being cited for marijuana possession. While Mosquera-Perea wasn’t in possession himself, his involvement in previous incidents forced Crean’s hand.

August 24, 2015: Holt and incoming Freshman Thomas Bryant were cited for possession of alcohol at a convenience store across the street from Assembly Hall. Holt would also be dismissed, bringing the total of drug/alcohol related arrests, suspensions, or injuries to 11 since February 2014.

These incidents, following another lackluster season where the Hoosiers miraculously made the tournament before getting knocked out in the first round by Wichita State, had Crean on possibly the hottest seat in college basketball.

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Rumors circulated daily as to whether or not Crean would be fired, how much would the buyout cost the university, and would Brad Stevens leave the Boston Celtics to take the job.

Entering the 2015-16 season, hopes were high again as the Hoosiers started the season ranked in the top 25 for the first time since the 2012-13 season, but with all the departures and controversy that clouded the program, the real question was whether or not Crean had the right kind of buy-in from his players to make this season successful.

With Ferrell starting his final campaign with the Hoosiers, joined by Bryant, sophomore James Blackmon Jr, junior Troy Williams, sophomore Robert Johnson and graduate transfer Max Bielfeldt, expectations where high, but guarded.

The wheels looked as if they were coming off early on this highly-touted team starting with a disastrous appearance at the Maui Invitational, where they lost to unranked Wake Forest and UNLV.

If the losses weren’t bad enough, the Hoosiers would lose Blackmon Jr., the team’s highest scoring player, to a season-ending knee injury. Couple that with an embarrassing thrashing at Duke, and many were openly wondering whether or not Crean should finish the season as head coach.

But what should have served as the death blow for the Hoosiers’ season turned into something completely different, something infinitely better.

Since losing Blackmon Jr. and the loss to Duke, Indiana rattled off 12 straight wins including opening the Big Ten season 7-0.

Despite a close overtime loss at Wisconsin, it was hard to deny that the remaining team bought into what Crean was trying to sell this season, and it’s clearly working.

Going into Tuesday night’s game at Iowa, all Indiana had to do was win one of their final two games to clinch the second outright Big Ten championship in four years. While no one expected Indiana to come out on top in such a tough road match, to do so would be a tremendous statement for the program.

Tuesday night, Tom Crean got out of basketball debt.

By winning at Iowa, Crean managed to accomplish his most signature win as the head coach of the Hoosiers.

Mar 1, 2016; Iowa City, IA, USA; Indiana Hoosiers guard Yogi Ferrell (11) reacts after the game against the Iowa Hawkeyes at Carver-Hawkeye Arena. Indiana won 81-78. Mandatory Credit: Jeffrey Becker-USA TODAY Sports /

While the buzzer beater at home against Kentucky will be the one people most remember, winning in Iowa, clinching the Big Ten championship decisively, in a road game finally gave Crean the win he needed to finally, after eight mercurial seasons, claim his legacy as the coach of the Hoosiers.

To his credit, more than any other season, Crean looks like he’s truly the coach, not just the curator and tour guide to Hoosier past glory. He’s doing far less in the way of selling the team and a lot more coaching. Just as his kids are buying in, the Iowa win afforded him the capital to get buy-in from the notoriously fickle fanbase.

For one night, fans and alumni are not whispering Brad Stevens’ name underneath their breath. For one night, they all dared look into the future, a future that has Tom Crean at the helm.

Of course, as with all fickle things, all the immediate goodwill Crean earned in the wake of the Iowa victory could evaporate immediately if the Hoosiers have yet another early exit. That said, with a field that has no absolute dominant team, Indiana’s projected high seed could help them actually reach the Final Four and get Crean a shot at a championship that would forever label him a hero in Bloomington.

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Whether or not that happens remains to be seen, but for now, Crean is coaching the Hoosiers in the black, and that could be a dangerous proposition for any team facing them in March.

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