Crean adapting to new job

Out with the blue, in with the red. \nFor Tom Crean, that means his wardrobe. And his gameday drink. \n“I was killing the Diet Pepsis the last few years during the games – three or four a game,” the new IU men’s basketball coach said. “My wife would just be miserable with me. Win or lose, she’d be more miserable with me for how many Diet Pepsis I drank during the game.”\nBut IU’s a Coke school – just another adjustment for Crean, hired last Tuesday to coach the Hoosiers after nine years at Marquette, whose colors are blue and gold. \nIn an interview Tuesday with the Indiana Daily Student, less than a week since he agreed to coach in Bloomington, Crean talked about the challenges and the thrills of his new job.\n“It hits me, not every day, but really about every hour about how big this job is – how big a deal it is to be the Indiana coach,” he said. “But at the same time, it drives me.”\nThe first jolt came last Tuesday, when Crean flew from Milwaukee to Bloomington and met a group of students at the Monroe County Airport.\nThat was the prelude, he said. Crean heard, or saw, rather, the overture the next morning when he was handed a red “Crean & Crimson” T-shirt.\nHe was thrilled.\nIt took his kids a little longer to share in the excitement.\n“This is the first time we’ve had change in our life with three children,” Crean said. “It will be a process for us.”\nCrean’s daughter, Megan, was only 3 years old when he took the head coaching job at Marquette. His son Riley and daughter Ainsley weren’t born yet.\n“I thought it was a great sign when I was home Thursday night that my son, Riley, was sleeping in his candy-stripe warm-ups that they gave him,” Crean said.\nAinsley’s still trying to pronounce “Bloomington,” he said.\nWhile Crean tries to hire a new staff and recruit a new crop of IU players, he and his wife have already begun their search for a home in Monroe County.\n“We don’t have a plan yet,” he said. \nHe hopes his kids can finish school in Wisconsin, but that could change, he said. \nIn the meantime, he’s been trying to soak it all in. \nHe peeked into the Dave Matthews concert Sunday at Assembly Hall to show someone the arena but was mobbed by a group of students who wanted to meet the new coach, get his autograph or grab him for a quick snapshot. \n“I’d have stayed in there all night, signing autographs and taking pictures, but that wasn’t the place to do it,” he said.\nHe hopes to interact with student fans on a regular basis. \n“We’re going to have great student involvement, as far as a staff as far as players as far as the head coach and his family,” said Crean, who did his best to invoke student support at Marquette. “The great thing to know is that it’s already built in.”\nHe’s been juggling engagements he made before his job switch with ones he’s made at IU. Crean, who said baseball was his first love as a kid, hopes he can make a singing engagement at Wrigley Field – the seventh-inning stretch at a Cubs game later this month. \n“That’s pressure, now,” said Crean, who’s sung “Take me out to the ballgame” at previous Cubs games. “That’s pressure. I’ve never coached in the National Championship game, but I’ve got to believe standing in front of all those fans in the seventh inning, that might be the equivalent.”\nCrean was joking, of course. He admits he still gets sick to his stomach before some games, a sign that it’s “usually going to be a good game.”\nHe craves the opportunity to coach in the National Championship game. He has ever since his first trip to the Final Four in 1987 as a 19-year-old college student. \nThat, most IU fans remember, was when Keith Smart hit a jumper from the baseline with five seconds left to give the Hoosiers a 74-73 win against Syracuse – IU’s last national title. \nCrean was there. \nAnd he hopes it’s not the last time he witnesses an IU championship. \n“That dream’s intact,” he said. “I could be coaching anywhere in America and that dream’s intact.”