While other Indiana athletic programs have become stalwarts in their respective sports, the men's basketball program has yet to meet the standards similar to former championship teams.
Athletic Director Fred Glass will retire without bringing sustained success to a team adored by so many Indiana fans. However, he is optimistic about the direction the program is headed under head coach Archie Miller.
After overseeing the reconstruction of Indiana’s athletics and facilities for more than a decade, Glass will step away having aided in the stability of various programs and hiring the current coaches residing over the football and basketball teams.
While so many of the University-sponsored sports have thrived during Glass’ tenure, this is Indiana, and the success of the basketball program will always carry more weight. No matter the Big Ten titles and nationally ranked teams that come from other sports, there remains an asterisk next to the legacy Glass will leave behind because of the lack of production from the men's basketball team.
He was responsible for overseeing all but six months of former Indiana head coach Tom Crean's tenure and hiring current head coach Archie Miller. The Hoosiers may sit at 10-1 this season — its best start since 2012 — but now in his third year, Miller has yet to take his team to the NCAA Tournament.
Despite experiencing both the highs and lows of a storied college basketball program that prides itself on national championships, Glass expressed his confidence in Miller and believes the team will continue to succeed after he retires.
“When push came to shove, our guys are tough,” Glass said of the Indiana men’s basketball team. “They're mentally tough. They make the plays you need to make to win, and that's Archie. That's why I'm super optimistic about the men's basketball program, and I think the sky's the limit there.”
Before Miller, Glass inherited a basketball team spearheaded by former head coach Kelvin Sampson, who was punished by the NCAA in 2008 for recruiting violations and banned from coaching college basketball for five years.
On top of a scandal that nearly cost the Hoosiers a future postseason ban, the team was still looking to rebuild a once-storied program after playing in the National Championship just once since earning a fifth banner in 1987.
“We were getting pitchers off the baseball team to dress and play,” Glass said. “It was really, really bad, and I give Tom Crean tremendous credit, through his will and perseverance, to bring us back to being relevant again.”
With Crean at the helm, it wasn’t until his fourth season that Indiana posted a winning record. In the three years prior, the team won a combined total of eight games in the Big Ten and failed to qualify for the NCAA Tournament.
In the next five years, however, the Hoosiers were Big Ten champions twice and appeared in the Sweet Sixteen three times, accomplishments that Glass said are nothing to sneeze at. But Crean’s team fell short of that winning standard after 2017 when Indiana received a first-round NIT loss at the hands of Georgia Tech despite a superior seeding.
Glass fired Crean in March of 2017 with an overall record of 166-135 and 71-91 in the Big Ten, leaving an opening for another head coach to be hired during his time as the Athletic Director.
Miller was next to step in and take the role of head coach at Indiana. Crean was unable to take the Hoosiers to the NCAA Tournament in five out of his nine years, so Glass put his faith in Miller and gave him a shot at restoring Indiana's program.
Come next year, Miller will be answering to a new athletic director whether he succeeds or fails.
“Personally, this is bittersweet,” Indiana men’s basketball head coach Archie Miller said. “But I am happy for Fred to be able to enjoy his family and he will always be a part of our program. Fred is as passionate about Indiana University as anyone you will ever meet and his impact on the University over the last 12 years is profound.”
Miller has steadily bettered the program in two years. After ending his first season without a postseason run, he returned in year two with an NIT appearance. Now, he'll look to push for the team's first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2016.
Glass reiterated his confidence in Miller — like all of the coaches he's hired over the past decade — because of his character.
“The facilities are important, the programming is important, the culture is important, but really what defines whether you're going to be successful or not is the quality of your head coaches,” Glass said. “And I feel we have a great group of head coaches, who are our faculty, which makes the future bright.”
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