NCAA Basketball: Coaching Carousel Update and Firings from early March

IUPUI

Matt Crenshaw has spent a long time as part of this IUPUI program, but he’s been dismissed after three seasons as the Jaguars’ head coach. It’s been a tumultuous run for the Jaguars in recent years, and Crenshaw finishes his head coaching run just 14-79. IUPUI was one of the nation’s worst programs yet again this season, finishing just 6-26 including a recent loss to an abysmal Detroit Mercy.

Crenshaw was a point guard at IUPUI under Ron Hunter back in the early 2000’s, playing in the NCAA Tournament during his junior season. After a brief professional playing career, Crenshaw’s collegiate coaching career began on Hunter’s bench back with his alma mater in 2006. He spent twelve years assisting three different head coaches before a three-year stint at Ball State. IUPUI then brought him home in 2021 to begin his head coaching career.

Clearly, it wasn’t a great start for Crenshaw’s head coaching career, as the Jaguars failed to gain any headway. That 2003 trip to the NCAA Tournament came back in the Mid-Continent Conference and remains IUPUI’s only trip to the Big Dance. Not much good has come from IUPUI’s first seven years in the Horizon League, and they’ve yet to have double-digit wins in a season since Jason Gardner’s dismissal in 2019.

We were in a national pandemic, but IUPUI had Byron Rimm as interim coach for two seasons before bringing back Crenshaw, a longtime assistant with no head coaching experience. While it’s untrue to say they’ll have more time for the search this time around, there’s certainly a bit of pressure to get this hire right. IUPUI has been living in the Horizon League’s basement in recent years, but the right guy can start turning things around in Indianapolis. Maybe they should look for someone with previous success as a head coach.