5/20/2022 basketball Edit

Former Indiana forward Derek Elston previews Indiana TBT team

Kyler Staley • TheHoosier

Basketball Recruiting Analyst

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The Indiana Assembly Ball TBT team has really started to pick up some steam over the last few weeks with the announcements of Devonte Green and Josh Newkirk being the first two players on the roster.

Someone that has played a big part behind the scenes with getting this team up and running has been former Indiana forward Derek Elston, who was a member of the 2013 Big Ten Championship.

The former Hoosier was able to take time and join the Indiana Sports Beat Radio powered by TheHoosier.com with Jim Coyle to discuss what his role was with the formation of this TBT team and what the roster could potentially look like as huge additions are expected to be announced in the coming weeks.

“Listen, you are going to see some names come across that Twitter page in the next couple weeks that are going to be exciting, especially for fans," Elston said.

Elston, who played for Indiana from 2009-13 and was on the staff as the Director of Player Development from 2015-19, has been a big supporter of the Indiana men's basketball program ever since his time with the Hoosiers came to an end.

When talks of an Indiana TBT team got started, Elston was one of the first people to be contacted.

“Well when the opportunity arose, it was more or less me being on the coaching staff than actually playing," Elston said. "I went down to Evansville, probably five, six months ago, and my boss wanted me to play in a pickup game and it took me, I think we played seven games, it took me every bit of three games to finally feel like I could loosen up a bit. So I don’t think I could compete with those guys but I really wanted to be on the coaching staff.”

Elson, who actually played professionally for two years after graduating from Indiana for overseas teams like Illiabum Club and the Plymouth City Patriots, shot down the idea of him playing for this Indiana TBT fairly quickly.

“I can’t do that," Elston said. "I can’t pull that off anymore. I’m scared to death to get hurt anymore so I really wanted to be on the coaching staff but with all the travel those guys do and Parker (his daughter) being as young as she is.

"I did everything in my power to get those guys connected to who was putting it on and I’m still involved in that figuring out names, and phone numbers, and sending emails to guys but as far as being like on the bench, I just wouldn’t be able to make it happen."

When wanting to construct a TBT team, the most obvious and important part of that is getting a list together of potential players that would make sense. Elston was a big part of getting that list of former Indiana players together.

“There is a lot of reaching out that you have to do to the (TBT) committee, you have to put a roster together," Elston said.

“In the beginning, I was the one putting the roster together, putting out names. They were running guys by me to see if it would work. There’s some teams in the past that have been all Ohio State players or you’ll still see a couple of Big Ten names.

“I was putting together a list of guys who I had numbers with or had guys that might be available.”

Elston would then go onto hint that there are some big names on this list that could possibly be announced as members of the Assembly Ball roster. Names that would surely have Indiana fans interested.

“I’m telling ya, there’s a couple names from these Big Ten Championships, especially in 2016, that I wouldn’t be surprised and I’m not going to give anything away," Elston said. "But if you see some names pop up, I think a lot of Hoosier fans are going to go ‘oh man, I’m definitely turning into this.’

“There’s some guys on this list that you kind of look at and go ‘how in the world did he not make an NBA roster?’”

As far as what names were hinted, guys like Cody Zeller, Yogi Ferrell, Noah Vonleh, D.J. White, Troy Williams, James Blackmon Jr. and Robert Johnson were just a few that were discussed on the show.

“All the guys on this list are still just unbelievable players," Elston added. "You got a guy like James Blackmon who is out there just absolutely tearing it up overseas. Troy Williams is over in China. If these guys commit to playing, its going to be a fun little ride for these guys.”

Another big name that was also mentioned was former Indiana guard and newly announced Team and Recruiting Coordinator Jordan Hulls, who is currently playing in Germany and is at the top of his game professionally.

“That’s never even registered to me so that’s a great call," Elston said. "I think if he was able to pull that off, plus he did that (TBT) for I believe three years, maybe two, so he has got some experience being there so that would be an unbelievable call."

One of the bigger questions for this upcoming team is who exactly is going to be the head coach? Elston was able to confirm that it will be former Indiana manager Trey Scotti.

“It’s going to be Trey Scotti, who was a former manager back when it was my first couple of years on staff and who then took off and went to Xavier and was under Travis Steele for about two or three years and then got an opportunity to coach or workout players with a facility that he was managing," Elston said.

"He just said he loved it. Loved that grind and loved kind of having his own schedule then presented me with this opportunity. So he just came to me one day a couple months back and said hey I’d love to get your input and I’d love to get you on the staff and I said I don’t know if would be able to do that but I will help you in any possibly way I could.”

One of the more difficult parts of this process will be the logistics of getting the guys together to practice since all these guys are coming from different areas of the world. One idea that was thrown around was getting the guys together in Bloomington.

"I don’t know if those details have been hashed out yet," Elston said. "I mean again there has only been two players that have been announced and again when I was shooting out names, it was all things that just sounded really good and now you got to try and get a commitment from those players.

“I think it might be a little difficult. I don’t know if Assembly would be willing to let them practice and I know these guys are coming from all areas of the world even so I think that’s going to be a hard part finding a place that is kind of centralized for everybody and is easy for everybody to get to. I think that’s going to be a big battle.”

Speaking of Assembly Hall, the idea was brought up that there could be a chance the Indiana fans see a few TBT games hosted there.

“I think that's the home run, and I don’t know if this is something that has even been talked about, but I know there for awhile they had some college teams, like the Wichita State TBT team actually got to host two or three games," Elston said.

"So if we could just get those guys back in Assembly, what that would do for fans as they are waiting for basketball season to come about I think would just be huge."

So as far as what to expect next, although not confirmed, with only two players being announced so far expect to see names continue to be announced in the coming weeks if this trend continues.

“With all the communication that I had done, I had no idea that they were even reaching out to guys yet so when I saw Devonte’s name come across, I kind of know he was one of the guys they wanted to get going, Josh was also on that list and his name just dropped the end of last week so I actually don’t know when these things are really happening.

“But there are some guys out there that are playing overseas or maybe had just stepped away from the league that might come up on this radar and I’m not going to give any away but there are going to be some exciting names and it’s going to be an opportunity for this team to just, on paper, look like it’s got a big shot to go far in this thing."