Chris Holtmann won't meet the Ohio State community until his introductory press conference Monday.
Not even 24 hours after being introduced as the Buckeyes' 14th men's basketball coach, he's making living arrangements, saying goodbye to friends in Indianapolis, and most importantly, assembling his new staff.
Like most new hires at major programs, you can expect Holtmann to bring in guys he has a relationship with – at the expense of Greg Paulus, Chris Jent and Dave Dickerson, the assistant coaches that remained on Ohio State's staff following Thad Matta's exit.
In fact, Matta did the same thing when he arrived in Columbus, filling his staff with him Alan Major and John Groce, who coached alongside Matta at Xavier, along with Dan Peters from Cincinnati.
NCAA rules permit teams three bench assistants and David Woods of the Indianapolis Star is reporting Holtmann intends to bring his entire three-man staff – Terry Johnson, Ryan Pedon and Mike Schrage. Complicating matters is the fact that Butler traditionally likes to hire from within. Each of the Bulldogs' previous five coaches were already on Butler's staff when promoted to the top spot and both Johnson and Pedon are expected to interview for the now vacant position. Naturally, neither coach will pass on the top job at Butler to follow Holtmann to Columbus.
Pedon, a Bexley native, is the staff recruiting ace. He played his college ball at Wooster and coached at Miami, Kent State and Toledo. He knows Ohio prep basketball extremely well and is tight with four-star class of 2018 small forward Jerome Hunter of Pickerington North and four-star class of 2019 point guard Jeremiah Francis of nearby Pickerington Central. He was also instrumental in landing Massillon's Kyle Young.
Another assistant on Holtmann's staff, Mike Schrage, is not expected to interview for the Butler job and should make the move to Ohio State.
Should Johnson or Pedon earn a promotion, there are another name out there worth keeping an eye on. A source tells Eleven Warriors that Holtmann really likes Aaron Fuss, who joined the staff at Tennessee-Chattanooga two weeks ago. Fuss was an Ohio State student manager, before spending nearly a decade in Athens where he started as the director of basketball operations and an assistant coach for Ohio University.
While with the Bobcats, Fuss was responsible for recruiting Central Ohio, pulling Rodney Culver, Doug Taylor, Jordan Daris and Jason Carter, who could play for Ohio State right now, in the last two years, alone.
