Fast & Furious

We figured it wouldn't be a quiet off-season and Tom Crean has not disappointed. Just in the past couple of weeks, IU has received commitments from 5 new players and hired 2 new assistant coaches.

The 5 players include a freshman commit for '08, a Juco commit for '08, a verbal commit for '09, and 2 walk-ons. I'll talk a little bit about each of these guys individually, but first some general comments. Later in the post, I will also comment on what I know about all of the current players. Until we get to that, here is a preview: I know nothing.

I think this has been some great work by Crean to get these 3 commitments this past week. I feel like there is a solid foundation that is being built with what appears to be high-character and hard-working guys that will likely stay around for 4 years. That said, we are talking about 3-star type players. These are not guys that are going to come in and dominate and win conference titles as freshmen and sophomores. However, they are the type of guys that are going to work hard and could develop into really good players as juniors and seniors. So, if Crean can continue to build this foundation and then land a big-time recruit or two in the next few years, we could be in great shape.

So, let's take a look at these guys.

Nick Williams
The biggest news was today's news that Nick Williams (pictured above) committed to be a Hoosier next year. Williams is a 6-4 guard from Alabama. At 215 pounds, he is a strong player that should be ready for Big Ten action as a freshman. Of course, if Bassett and Ellis are not reinstated, he will play whether he's ready or not. But he definitely looks strong. He's described as a high quality, high character kid and his high school team was nationally ranked all 4 years. In addition, his team won the state title when he was a junior and he was the 6A state player of the year as a senior. Also described to have a very strong work ethic. I like that he looks mean and tough.

As for his game, it sounds like he played more inside as a freshman and sophomore, so he is still developing a polished outside game. Obviously, you need to have solid skills on the perimeter if you want to play guard in big-time college ball, but I do like guards that can go down low and mix it up.

Williams was a Marquette target and ultimately decided he still wanted to play for Tom Crean. He is the rivals #145 player in the class and the #34 shooting guard. However, ESPN has him as the #40 player overall and #9 shooting guard. That just shows you that beyond the Top 10 or 20, nobody really knows what they are talking about when they attempt to rank recruits.

Devan Dumes
Dumes is a 6-2, 185-lb combo guard that will be a Juco transfer from Vincennes. He went to Decatur Central in high school and was named to 1st-team all-state as a senior with the likes of Mike Conley Jr, Greg Oden, and Eric Gordon. Dumes went to Eastern Michigan as a freshman and then decided to go to Vincennes. At Eastern Michigan, he averaged 8.1 points and 1.6 assists as a freshman. At Vincennes, he averaged 16.9 points, 4 assists, 3.6 rebounds, 84% from the line, 41% from the field, 39.9% from the arc, and set a school record with 109 made 3-pointers. That's a lot of 3-pointers to launch and make while holding steady at a 40% clip.

There might be some concern with going the Juco route, but I like Crean's approach and it sounds like he is pretty careful with both the type of kid and the type of program he will recruit from. In this case, I like that this is an Indiana kid and an Indiana program. Often, one of the concerns with a junior college player is their dedication to the classroom. However, Dumes made the Dean's List while at Eastern Michigan. I think it was mainly a case where he wasn't happy at Eastern Michigan, but at the time, he probably didn't have a lot of choices to go to any bigger programs.

This one is a tough call as to whether he will be able to help the Hoosiers. If Bassett is not allowed back on the team, I think he will have to see playing time. However, keep in mind that Jamarcus Ellis was Juco Player of the Year and both Lance Stemler and Mike White were higher rated Juco players than Dumes. But again, I'm not too confident in these ranking services, especially for Juco players.

It does sound like Dumes is willing to play defense and anybody who can hit 3s with regularity and shoot 84% from the line should be able to help the team in some way.

Bobby Capobianco
A verbal commitment for the 2009 class. I tend not to spend a lot of time on commitments that are further out than the upcoming season. For example, at one time, IU's class for next year included Eshaunte Jones, Bud Mackey, Devin Ebanks, and Terrell Holloway.

Anyway, Capobianco seems pretty solid with his verbal. Another Marquette target that was ecstatic with the news of Crean going to IU. As an Ohio player, Bobby C's only hesitation about Marquette was the distance from his home. So when Crean came calling as IU's head man, this was a slam dunk.

Capobianco is 6-8 and 220 pounds. He is projected to play the 4-spot. IU's other verbal commit for '09, Tipton's Derek Elston is also 6-8 but Elston is expected to play the 3-spot.

I'm reading good things about Capobianco and many think that his ranking will be on the rise after this year's AAU ball.

Daniel Moore
5-10 guard out of Carmel turned down a scholarship at Boston U to walk-on at IU. As a senior, he averaged 13.5 points, 7.6 assists, and 3.4 rebounds per game and was named 1st team senior all-state.

I generally don't get too excited about walk-ons, but I think this is a definite positive for IU. At the very least, this is a kid who will come to practice everyday and work his butt off and make his teammates better. I would say the most we could hope for is an Errik Suhr type of player that could offer some spot contributions.

Kory Barnett
Another walk-on that I haven't heard much about. I think I saw that he is 6-5 and that he is a hustler that doesn't score much, but does the little things. I wouldn't expect him to see much of the floor in 4 years, but who knows.

All in all, each of these guys has been described as hard-working and high-character. The same can be said for the recruits already in place (Pritchard, Roth, and Elston). I think this is a very important step in rebuilding the program. This program desperately needs some stability and these guys we are talking about today might be able to offer that.

A couple notes on the assistant coaches. Buckley seemed to be a no-brainer in that he was an existing Crean assistant and his past experience at Ball State. The one that has made some IU fans squirm is Bennie Seltzer. Seltzer played for and coached under Kelvin Sampson. It should be noted that Seltzer was not named in any way to the phone call issues at Oklahoma, but the idea that he worked under Sampson has still made some IU fans a little queasy.

As for the current players, there just has not been much news on that front.

Some of the rumors around Bassett and Ellis seem to be dependent on their grades for the spring semester. After a solid fall semester, it sounds like the spring semester currently looks horrible for the team as a whole. The rumor is that Crean is waiting to see if these guys make grades before he considers reinstating them. I guess that makes some sense -- why reinstate a guy who is then going to be immediately suspended for the fall semester and first 10 or so games of the year.

The other rumors around this situation tend to put Bassett in a much more positive light than Ellis. There aren't really reasons given, but some people are guessing that Bassett will be back and Ellis won't. Who knows.

I'm really curious about Eli Holman. There were plenty of news reports that he was going home for a weekend a few weeks ago to consider his future, but then we never heard anything. We do know that he is back in Bloomington and in school, but there has not been any word on whether he is definitely staying or not.

Another interesting note on Holman is that Peegs has him listed as a freshman for the '08 season. I don't believe he was red-shirted this past year, but I do think he would be granted a medical redshirt. However, my understanding is that a medical redshirt is not even considered until the player's other 3 years of eligibility are used up. Anyway, if you do consider Holman a freshman for the upcoming class, then it is starting to round into a nice class with Roth, Williams, Pritchard, and Holman. It would be nice to add a true point guard and a true post player, but the fact is that there just aren't any of quality left for the '08 class.

Brandon McGee has said that he will be back next year. I think McGee has some talent and I hope that Crean can get it out of him. In his limited time last year, McGee appeared to be lazy and complacent, so it will be interesting to see if Crean can get him to play at a higher level.

Crawford says he's back. If Bassett and Ellis aren't allowed back, then it could be Crawford that leads this team. A little scary, but Jordan could turn out to be a great player. I just think he's on a faster track than you would like. He played more than expected as a freshman due to Ratliff's problems and Bassett's 3-game suspension. Now as a sophomore, he will likely see 32+ minutes per game. You just hope that he continues to improve and all this playing time leads to a great player in his upper-classmen years.

DeAndre Thomas -- virtually no news on Big Dre.

Taber will be back and could very well be a starter on next year's team.

I don't believe there has been any word yet on Crean's 3rd assistant, but I believe he was hoping to name somebody this week.

I know Cook wants to hear more about potential recruits, but I find tracking the recruits to be exhausting and often disappointing. Also, it's late and I'm tired.

However, not to leave Ryun empty-handed, he also wanted a prediction on the number of wins for next year. Obviously, the Bassett and Ellis situation will play a large role in that. But as it stands, those guys are not on the team, so I will make my prediction assuming that those guys are off the team and I will go with 15 wins next year. I think they will have some guys that are willing to work hard and I think Crean will work hard and that alone will get them wins against lesser opponents. However, they just won't have any big guys with any skills and won't have a whole lot of talent on the team as a whole. I'm looking at the next two years as rebuilding and looking to years 3 and 4 and beyond to really have this team back on track. I like everything that Crean is doing so far and have high hopes that he will restore the glory to old IU.

Go Hoosiers!