The Indiana University Indianapolis men’s basketball team took two weeks to replace Paul Corsaro, and now 38-year-old former West Liberty head coach Ben Howlett–whose official first day at his new job was earlier this week–is trying to fill up his roster from a mostly-bare office in the National Institute for Fitness and Sport (NIFS) while living in an AirBnB on the Westside of Indianapolis as his wife Jessica watches their two-year-old daughter and tries to get their house sold back in West Virginia.
In his time away from basketball, Howlett likes to fish and run and play pickleball, but while a lot of that is on hold for the moment, that doesn’t mean you’re going to find him lamenting any of the challenges in front of him. “You know, the momentum that Indianapolis has right now,” he says, “with the Pacers and and Caitlin Clark and everything going on there, but also the brand of basketball that we’re going to bring over…is going to be really exciting.”
As for why he jumped now for a new role after spending all but one of the past 20 years coaching and playing at the same institution, well, apparently it was time to get “uncomfortable” again.
“Winning…gets rid of a lot of problems,” Howlett says, “but I felt like after all that time I’d done everything I possibly could at West Liberty. There was nothing more I could have done besides winning a national championship game, and that’s hard to do at any level. So it’s almost like I needed a little bit of a shot in the arm, and I was getting pretty comfortable, and I always preached to my players…’Let’s get uncomfortable today.’ Well, it’s time for me to practice what I preach and get uncomfortable…it was just the right time for me to to leave, and I feel like the situation there is in great hands.”
Howlett intends to bring Dan Monteroso to Indianapolis from his recent coaching staff at West Liberty, as well as Connor Harr who was most recently with the NBA G League team, Osceola Magic, but who has coached with Howlett before.
As predicted, some of the roster problems will be solved by Howlett’s bringing guys over from his previous institution: Finley Woodward, Kyler D’Augustino, JP Dragus, Aiden Miller (who had been an anticipated transfer coming to West Liberty from Point Park in Pittsburgh), and Reece Hagy (who most recently played for Air Force Prep).
From the group of players coming over from West Liberty, D’Augustino led the Hilltoppers in scoring during his sophomore campaign, while Woodward also scored in the double digits, and Dragus shot 46% from the 3-point line as a freshman.
As a team, they finished 30-5, won the Mountain East Conference, and played their way to the Division II Elite 8. That level of success is hardly unprecedented at West Liberty, as Howlett’s 2022-2023 team had the chance to play for the national title, though they fell to Nova Southeastern in Evansville, 111-101.
That game was actually Howlett’s second opportunity to coach in a national championship game, as he also did so as an assistant coach when West Liberty lost to Central Missouri at the end of the 2013-2014 season.
His players coming over from West Liberty–like Corsaro’s players who came over from the University of Indianapolis–will be making the jump from Division II basketball to Division I in the Horizon League. “I’ve got some friends that coach in the Horizon League,” Howlett says, “and I’ve talked to them at long lengths about the league itself and and the one thing that is constant is the physicality of the league. It’s a very physical league.”
Even so, Howlett thinks his team’s style will be bringing something unique both to the conference and even to the Division I level: “How we play is different than any team that you’re going to see…We’re going to be the aggressor, we’re going to be the ones doing the hunting.”
Those in Indianapolis watching the Pacers may recognize some of the style upcoming Jaguar teams will try to play: defending teams the length of the floor, a team that wants to score points in transition, and an offense that is more reliant on motion principles than set plays.
“ It’s exhausting,” says John Korte, a recent player for West Liberty who transferred from a rival school to play for Howlett and who just finished his first season of playing professionally in Europe. “There’s no ifs, ands, or buts about it. I would happily go straight back into that full court system, though. It’s so much fun.”
Korte predicts that IU Indy players will learn the kinds of decision-making that is necessary to play in Howlett’s system by playing a strong dose of 3-on-3 this summer.
”We would always talk about…having numerical advantages,” Korte says. “So basically we want to be able to…beat the guy off the step or put them in an action where they’re gonna have to commit two. And then from there…it’s probably two of our guys on offense versus one of theirs on defense. They have to make a decision, and we make a decision based off what they do…So we want them to be three on two, two on one.”
Style aside, IU Indy’s roster of players, whomever they ultimately end up being, will also be doused with a couple cultural rules that may come as a bit of surprise. “Number one,” Howlett says, “no cursing, and that goes for my staff. The players, I don’t allow it, and there’s no warning. I just, it’s super easy, not to curse…I know when they go back to their dorm room, it’s different, right? I get that, I was in college once, too…but like, when they’re here, we’re just going to have people around the program. It doesn’t give off a good look…I think these guys got it pretty good at the age of 18 to 23 years old. They’re playing basketball. They’re living with their buddies. They’re eating three meals a day. They’re getting their uniforms washed. What do they have to complain about?”
From his time playing for Howlett as recent as the 2023-2024 season, Alek West remembered one of the two rules: ”I think he had a lot more than two rules,” West admits. “The two that stick out to me are no swearing and no air-balling.”
Having returned to the Toledo area where he is preparing for medical school, what West is more confident in is how much he’ll be paying paying attention to the Jaguars in the upcoming season: “Going to West Liberty and like having him be my coach was probably, well not probably, was the best thing that could have happened to me…(It) kind of changed my life and like the trajectory of my basketball career…I’m just super grateful for what he’s done for me, and…I’m excited for him…That’s what he loves to do. (Indianapolis is) like a three-and-a-half hour drive and then I’m pretty close to Wright State, Oakland, Detroit Mercy, Cleveland State…I don’t know if you know any of the people who are committed there already, but I’m pretty close with one of them…I already told him, I’ll be at any game that I physically can be at.”
