Darian DeVries' vision becomes legitimate reality with Indiana basketball as roster takes shape

When Darian DeVries took over as the Indiana basketball head coach last month, he made it evident what his roster was going to look like. While it’s easy to say — he’s followed it up with legitimate actions — bringing his vision into a reality.

A Darian DeVries system is headlined by shooters, playmakers and facilitators. He wants to push the pace when available, but do so efficiently and effectively.

So, how is his roster coming together? He first landed a steady point guard in Conor Enright — an important piece to the puzzle with two years of experience playing in DeVries’ system at Drake. His most efficient season came during his second year at Drake. So, with Enright and Tucker DeVries in the fold, you have your initial culture-setters.

After that, it was about finding the ‘fit’ at forward to allow the rest of your roster to be built out. While Reed Bailey isn’t the ‘sexy’ name — it’s one of the most pivotal additions thus far. He’s a hybrid forward who can create a bit off the dribble, stretch the floor and most importantly be used as a passer. He averaged 3.8 assists a game with an assist rate of 25 percent this past season — both would have been second on IU’s roster.

With three core pieces in the fold, Indiana went out and secured a monster addition — Lamar Wilkerson. There are always terrific players in the portal, but you don’t often find ones that shot 44.5 percent from three on 3.4 made 3s a game. A 20.5 point per game scorer, Wilkerson fits into the ‘star’ role for Indiana and now creates a perfect Batman-Robin punch with Tucker DeVries.

Between that duo, they combined for 7.7 made 3s a game last year. Indiana basketball as a team averaged 6.3 a game.

But Darian DeVries wasn’t satisfied with just that backcourt / wing rotation. And, as Florida showed this year — you can never have enough shooting and playmakers on the floor. Now, it’s a roster that many teams around the country will try to emulate.

“I was talking to Todd Golden during the NCAA Tournament run,” On3 National Reporter Jamie Shaw said on ISB Radio. “How did you put together — what did you look for when piecing together this roster? ‘I want to be able to put five guys on the floor who can make plays with the ball in his hands’ and that’s the direction lot of basketball is going in these days … you want guys who can make a decision with the ball.”

Enter Tayton Conerway and Jasai Miles — two players who solidified Indiana’s backcourt and just emphasized that ‘playmaking’ mantra even more.

Conerway was the Sun Belt Player of the Year who averaged 4.8 assists and 2.9 steals a game. He’s the definition of a true floor general and one who also has the ability to get into the paint and score at the rim — averaging 14.2 points a game. His addition and pair next to Conor Enright now gives Indiana two tremendous facilitators who had assist rates of over 35 percent last season.

Two ideal players for a team looking to have floor spacers and shooters on the perimeter.

“He’s a type of guy who elevates the floor of a team. He’s a strong, physical player. He heats up the point of attack and he won the Sun Belt Player of the Year last year off of winning plays,” Shaw said. ” … he won it off of elevating the floor. He has positional size and defends at the point of attack. He’s somebody Indiana fans will come to love — he’s kinda a throw back type of guy to the old school type of ways that they had on the team.”

While Miles isn’t a shooter who will light it up from the perimeter, shooting just 33.5 percent a season ago, he hit 78 3s and that is 16 more than Luke Goode — IU’s leading shooter — hit this past season and would have been the most on an Indiana roster since James Blackmon in 2016-17.

So, adding Miles to a duo of DeVries and Wilkerson and Indiana basketball now has a very formidable shooting team. But, that’s not even the strength of his game.

“Jasai Miles can just go score the ball,” Shaw said. ” … he’s a guy as a sophomore with positional size, knows how to put the ball in the basket … what are the roles off of the bench — what are the roles, where does he come in at? He’s somebody who can put numbers on the board. Both (Miles, Conerway) of those guys are very, very big parts to the overall pieces of what’s being built here (at Indiana).”

At the core of Indiana’s roster are players who are tough, versatile and can make plays with the ball. That’s the vision that Darian DeVries set out during his introductory press conference. Very rarely do you see that come to fruition in the first 30 days, yet that’s what’s unfolding.

“Now we are having an understanding of what this team will look like,” Shaw said. “You have a baseline of guys who have experience, put up stats at the Division I level already — with those six guys coming in, you can get a feeling of what the rotation will look like and how whey’ll play, along with the versatility … you have an understanding of the core, what this team will look like.

“This is starting to make the looks of a pretty intriguing roster.”

Indiana basketball still has a roster to finalize and there are certainly other skillsets that need to be added — but DeVries is making sure that ‘fit’ for his identity and culture is not a secondary box to check. Even with that, he’s putting together a roster with highly skillet players.

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