Robbie Hummel Reveals His Choice For Next Indiana Basketball Coach

Plenty of names have been thrown out for the Indiana basketball head coaching job, and Robbie Hummel chimed in with his pick on Friday.

Hummel was a three-time All-Big Ten player at Purdue from 2007-12, and he’s now a college basketball television analyst. He spoke on a recent Field of 68 podcast with college basketball reporter Jeff Goodman, who asked Hummel who he would hire at Indiana.

“I like [Greg] McDermott,” Hummel said. “And maybe that’s biased because I’ve seen so much of Creighton, but I love their offense. It’s modern. They shoot a ton of threes. He’s won with – not that Creighton has bad resources, but less resources than what Indiana has. He’s a really good coach. I think his demeanor is perfect for that. He’s a great guy. And maybe he could want to stay at Creighton, I have no idea. … And they’ve got a great deal there. That arena’s awesome.”

“To me, I think it would be hard for him to leave Creighton at the end of the day,” Goodman responded. “You know, like, they love him there. He’s done a ton. He’s got a great quality of life.”

We included McDermott as a potential candidate as part of our Hoosiers On SI coach search series. To read that full article, CLICK HERE.

Creighton coach Greg McDermott against Georgetown at the CHI Health Center. | Steven Branscombe-Imagn Images

McDermott is an appealing option for several reasons. He's coming off his most successful five-year run across 15 seasons at Creighton. He won his first Big East regular season title in 2019-20 and was in contention for a No. 2 seed in the NCAA Tournament before it was canceled. He followed that up with an Elite Eight run, two trips to the Sweet 16 and a Round of 32 appearance the next four seasons.

The Bluejays have a 20-8 overall record, and they’re in second place in the Big East with a 13-4 conference record, trailing St. John’s by two games. Over the last eight seasons, Creighton has placed fourth or higher in the Big East standings every year, including one conference title and two second-place finishes.

In eight of the last 15 seasons under McDermott, Creighton has ranked top 10 nationally in effective field goal percentage, which adjusts field goal percentage to account for the added value of three-point shots. It led the nation in that category twice and ranked top three in two additional seasons.

Creighton does so with a large sample size, too. In 12 of 15 seasons, McDermott’s team has ranked in the top 100 nationally in 3-point attempt rate. The Bluejays were within the top 50 in eight of those seasons, and they’ve ranked eighth the last two years.

From a roster standpoint, if McDermott was ever going to leave Creighton, the timing after the 2024-25 season would make sense. All-Big East center Ryan Kalkbrenner is set to graduate after climbing to second on Creighton’s all-time scoring chart, while second- and third-leading scorers Steven Ashworth and Jamiya Neal will be gone, too.

McDermott was thought to be a candidate for the Louisville and Ohio State jobs last year, but Creighton stepped up with a four-year extension through the 2027-28 season to help keep him in Omaha. Terms were not disclosed because Creighton is a private university, but CBS Sports reported the new contract put McDermott into the higher tier of Big East coaches.

"There is no place I would rather be for the rest of my career than Creighton," McDermott said in the program’s news release.

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