Matt Painter always dreamed about coaching with his mentor.After playing for the legendary coach Gene Keady at Purdue from 1990-93 and entering the collegiate coaching profession, Painter made it a goal of his to one day coach with Keady.
But what Painter never could have imagined was that he would be named Keady’s successor after the 68-year-old coach retires at the end of this season.
“He’s been great to me and he’s been very loyal,” Painter said of Keady. “I think it’s a favorable scenario to implement when you’re dealing with an administration and with people who are familiar with each other.”
Painter said since he already had a relationship with Keady, this was the right way to make the otherwise difficult transition to a new coach.
“I don’t know about bringing somebody in to be an assistant for a year that’s not familiar with the head coach, not familiar with the institution and not familiar with the situation,” said Painter, who is the associate head coach at Purdue.
Once Keady, who is the Big Ten’s second winningest coach of all time with 510 wins, met with the Purdue administration and announced he would not return following the 2004-05 season, he went right to work trying to find a credible replacement for his team.
“(Painter) knows what I want, and he runs the same system,” Keady said. “The terminology won’t change much (next season).”
Although Keady had rejected Painter for assistant positions in the past, he decided on the 34-year-old head coach from Southern Illinois as his replacement.
“I would be a liar to say I wasn’t hurt by (being denied assistant coaching positions from Purdue in the past),” Painter said. “But it was the best thing for me to go to different levels and to move up and learn a lot of things on my own.”
It didn’t take long for Painter to be welcomed back into the Purdue family.
And now that the Boilermakers have had an opportunity to get to know their future head coach, they have noticed a few similarities between Painter and Keady.
“They’re both so competitive,” guard Brandon McKnight said. “(Painter) is a basketball junkie. He’ll sit and talk to you about basketball for hours.”
While Painter’s future is set for next season, Keady is not ruling out a possible return to basketball — either at the college level or the professional ranks.
“If somebody had the right offer, I certainly might consider it, sure,” Keady said.
Keady has discussed the matter with his wife, Patricia, but that’s as far as he has divulged his plans.
“We talked about a couple places we might want to live, but that’s as far as that conversation went,” Keady said. “We’re not concerned about that right now. We like it here.”
Northwestern coach Bill Carmody has first-hand knowledge of Painter’s experiences after holding a similar position during his time at Princeton.
Carmody was following a coaching legend, Pete Carril, and the Princeton athletics department avoided any controversy by giving Carmody a vote of confidence that he could be a worthy successor.
“I think it’s a good thing, and then you don’t have all this circus kind of atmosphere where you mention everybody’s name,” Carmody said.
Carmody spent 12 years as an assistant at Princeton before being named the associate head coach.
“Basically what it says is: ‘Stay here, don’t look for another job and when this guy retires, you’ll get the job.'” Carmody said. “It gives you that built-in respect.”
While Carmody inherited a Princeton team that had achieved some success, especially in the NCAA tournament, Painter will be taking on the tough task of resurrecting a Purdue program that has struggled for much of this season.
The Boilermakers are tied for last in the Big Ten standings with a 1-7 conference record, and they have a 5-14 overall mark.
Purdue is also last in scoring margin and last in defensive field goal percentage.
“People want to know if it’s working or not working now,” Painter said. “That has nothing to do with it. It has to do with three or four years down the road. Then you can ask the question: ‘Was this transition the right move?'”
Reach Zach Silka at [email protected].
