Recap of Dan Dakich on “The Front Row Ticket”

Dan Dakich, who led the Hoosiers during one of the most chaotic stretches in school history last spring, sounded off this afternoon on the Louisville based radio show “The Front Row Ticket.” Here’s a transcript:

On the title if he were to write a book about his last six weeks at IU:

“Oh man, I don’t know. Angelo Pizzo, the guy who wrote Hoosiers, told me we need a third act and we’ve got a movie. He said it’s going to be ‘Hoosiers, Rudy and then Dakich.’ I don’t know, ‘Managing Chaos,’ I have no idea.”

On whether or not he was prepared to kick more players off the team at IU had he stayed on the job another day:

“One more day. One more day and I had two others that were outta there. There’s no doubt about that. I didn’t have time on that particular day, but you know, what Tom has done coming in there is what I told him he was going to do.”

“He had to make his own decisions. A new coach comes in, you’ve gotta figure out what you want to do and how you want to do things and give people chances. But the time Tom and I sat down and talked about it, I told him what the end result was going to be because it was not something that wasn’t obvious. It was something that absolutely needed to happen.”

“Unfortunately, in my opinion, for the players involved I think it’s unfortunate for them, because they, in my opinion again, got rid of a great opportunity, threw away a great opportunity at a great basketball program and a great school. I don’t care where you go, unless you transfer to Louisville or Kentucky or Duke or Carolina or UCLA, you’re never going to go any place that matches what IU has, other than those other schools that I just mentioned.”

On what has transpired since his departure and the fallout from last season:

“I think the culture needed to change. I said that after we played Arkansas and I was criticized by a number of different groups of people, but it just needed to be. Unfortunately for me, I’ve never been one that is good at beating around the bush. I pretty much say what needs to happen and then people criticize and then generally it happens.”

“In terms of Greenspan, I feel bad, very bad for Rick. I think Rick’s done a lot of great things at IU, I really do. The facilities that are going up are tremendous. His attempt and I think rightfully so, to push football into a very competitive place is what you have to do at a school like Indiana. Rick was certainly trying to do that as evidenced by what he’s doing with the facilities. I feel bad for Rick, I really do. I like Rick, Rick gave me a great opportunity, I didn’t necessarily agree with all the things that went down late in my tenure at Indiana, but that’s the way life is.”

“It amazes me the amount of people that were affected by all of this. When you think about Kelvin Sampson, I think about Kellen and his daughter Lauren and his wife. They had a beautiful home, Lauren had a great job, Kellen is a great kid. I think about my own family, my kid. Rick Greenspan and his family. Tim Fitzpatrick, his wife and newly adopted son. The managers that were there. The fallout for the people has been so wide ranged and so sweeping that it makes me really sad. It didn’t need to happen, but it did.”

“Jennifer Brinegar, who was the compliance director at IU and I’ve never been anywhere and I hope the NCAA is listening to this, where compliance was so strict. Now I was there after it all went down in terms of the phone calls and things and the investigation was starting, so I wasn’t there when it was all really happening, but in my term there, Jennifer Brinegar and her staff, Ian Rickerby, did a great job.”

Filed to: Dan Dakich