An Iowa assist
Jake Kelly didn’t only dish out assists for the Iowa basketball team.
The former Hawkeye also benefited from an assist by his former Iowa coach.
Kelly talked about his decision to leave the Hawkeyes and transfer closer to home in an article that appeared today at ESPN.com, discussing how he wrestled with where he wanted to be following his mother’s death.
“As the season went by and it started getting further and further from the time she died, I knew Iowa wasn’t where I was supposed to be,” Kelly told the website. “Then I went home for Christmas break and it was such a sad time without her, but my family was there. I kind of knew I needed to come back and be with my family.”
Kelly didn’t reach a final decision until the season ended, but followed a younger brother back to the family home in Terre Haute, Ind., where Kelly will continue his career at Indiana State.
He informed coach Todd Lickliter of that decision in late March, at the same time that three other Hawkeyes were punching their tickets out of town. But Kelly’s decision was different and before the NCAA made its decision, Lickliter wrote a letter to the organization on Kelly’s behalf.
The Iowa coach told ESPN.com that he went as far as to write that Kelly deserved the chance to take the floor with the Sycamores this season, a decision the NCAA agreed with last week when it granted Kelly a hardship waiver that allows him to begin his junior season next week when practices begin.
“Sure, it was a difficult thing to do. We would have loved to have Jake as a Hawkeye,” Lickliter told the website. “But I don’t think you don’t do what’s right because you’re feeling sorry for yourself or you’re going through a rough time. I trusted him. I believed him and I could see nothing gained by making him suffer more.”
That provides a hint as to what type of coach Gary Barta hired a little more than two years ago.
