How Michigan's Dusty May went from 'trying to beg' for a job at the Final Four to the cusp of a national title

INDIANAPOLIS — Dusty May’s first trip to a Final Four in Indianapolis was a bit less glamorous than his current one.

He and three other Indiana men’s basketball student managers spent multiple days posted up in the lobby of the downtown Indianapolis Marriott that was hosting the National Association of Basketball Coaches’ annual convention. Their goal was to introduce themselves to as many big-time coaches as possible and to leave Final Four weekend with an offer to join one of their staffs as a graduate assistant.

Advertisement

“All of us managers who wanted to find a way into coaching in any capacity would pile in a car and just get out and hopefully bump into any coach and find a way to make an impression,” May said. “So it’s just a full-circle moment to go from chasing around coaches trying to beg for a GA spot to being back here with this team.”

More than a quarter century after May, Joe Pasternack, Dan Block and Matthew Babrick all came to the 2000 Final Four eager to find an entry point into coaching, at least three of those four former Indiana student managers plan to be back in Indianapolis. Babrick said he and his two sons are flying in from Los Angeles to watch May try to win his first national title when Michigan takes on UConn on Monday night. Block is also expected to attend, according to May.

The lessons that May took from working as a student manager under Bob Knight have helped shape the way he approaches the game to this day. No, the perpetually calm, collected May doesn’t emulate Knight’s fiery temper and drill-sergeant demeanor. He has instead taken Knight’s work ethic, attention to detail and knack for teaching and blended them with new-school ideas about creating a supportive environment and turning mistakes into learning opportunities.

“Those are the things I learned most from Coach Knight, the preparation, the anticipation of whatever comes next,” May said. “Obviously there's a fear element and a fear of disappointing him, so you wanted to be thinking ahead, you wanted to be on your toes, you were always anticipating what's next. Looking back, I think that’s probably one of the biggest components of problem solving.”

May did not always grow up dreaming of filling Gatorade jugs and sweeping floors while he was in college. It was only after the 5-foot-10 point guard realized that all-out hustle and basketball IQ were only going to take him so far that he pivoted to pursuing coaching.

Advertisement

That realization came early in May’s freshman season playing for NAIA Oakland City University. May transferred to Indiana in hopes of becoming a manager under Knight, an opportunity that has served as a launching pad for the likes of former NBA head coach Lawrence Frank, Duke special assistant Mike Schrage and Pasternack, now UC Santa Barbara’s head coach.

Securing a coveted student manager position under Knight was not as easy as just showing up at Assembly Hall on the first day of practice. Indiana men’s basketball had 16 student managers — four freshman, four sophomores, four juniors and four seniors. Each year, 120 freshmen applied for four spots, Babrick said.

Remarkably, May owes his successful application to a lawn mower. When May was in high school, he did some yard work for longtime Indiana team physician, Dr. Larry Rink, according to a 2023 story in the Indianapolis Star. When May transferred to Indiana, the doctor put in a good word for him with Knight.

Freshman managers, according to Babrick, did “all the grunt work.” They filmed practice. They did laundry. They prepared the water jugs. They laid out note cards for Knight to write on. They taped white lines on the court.

Advertisement

Then as managers earned more responsibility, they inherited greater responsibility. They worked long hours watching VHS tapes of future opponents and hand-charting their offensive and defensive sets, their out-of-bounds plays, the location of their makes and misses. Then they would provide that data to the coaching staff to help inform their scouting reports.

“It was horse-and-buggy stuff,” Babrick said, laughing at how far technology has come in a quarter century.

Where May stood out was his willingness to go above and beyond. He and Babrick delivered donuts to Knight at his hotel room the morning of a road game. He and Babrick drove to and from Indianapolis to pick up basketball luminaries who came to visit Knight at the airport. He and Babrick put players through voluntary workouts and worked at Knight's summer camp.  When the basketball secretaries were out of town during the offseason, he and Babrick would volunteer to answer phones all day.

Advertisement

The purpose of all those extras was the possibility that Knight would one day pick up the phone on behalf of May or Babrick and advocate for them to secure a position on another coach’s staff.

“That was what all the blood, sweat, tears you gave the Indiana men's basketball program was for,” Babrick said. “You wanted a two-minute phone call from Bob Knight to your top college coach. And in order to get that two minutes, you had to bust your ass for four years.”

For May, Babrick and the others, the purpose of the trip to Indianapolis during the 2000 Final Four was to make connections with prominent coaches. As Babrick explained, “When you work for Coach Knight, nothing intimidates you. You’ve already been through it all.”

Babrick already had a preexisting relationship with Stanford coach Mike Montgomery from sending him video tapes of upcoming opponents. He secured a position on Montgomery’s staff by following the Stanford coach to a urinal in the men’s restroom inside the lobby of the downtown Indianapolis Marriott.

Advertisement

“Fine I’ll finally give you a job,” Babrick recalled Montgomery saying. “Whatever I have to do to get you to leave me alone.”

May’s first job offer didn’t come until later that spring. When former USC coach Henry Bibby was at an AAU event, he mentioned to Indiana assistants Mike Davis and John Treloar that he had just fired his director of basketball operations because he didn’t work hard enough.

“Coach Treloar and Coach Davis looked at him and said, ‘We've got a guy for you,’” May said. “So that's how I was able to get a job in coaching. For whatever reason the stars were aligned and I fell into that spot.”

That was the start of a long coaching journey for May, much of it through college basketball’s backwaters. He served as an assistant coach at Eastern Michigan, Murray State, UAB, Louisiana Tech and Florida before finally landing his first head coaching job at FAU at age 41. May then gradually built that program for four years before breaking through in year five, taking the Owls to an improbable Final Four.

Advertisement

May has since blossomed from rising star at FAU into proven winner at Michigan, but he’s not the only one of his former Indiana student managers who has found success. Pasternack has led UC Santa Barbara to a pair of NCAA tournaments. Since leaving coaching in 2003, Babrick has thrived in the finance industry, while Block works in pharmaceutical sales.

Where Babrick sees the influence of Knight most is in May’s preparation. He wasn’t surprised that TV cameras caught May sitting courtside scouting UConn-Illinois on Saturday even though Michigan’s semifinal against Arizona tipped off afterward.

Most head coaches might leave that responsibility to the assistant in charge of preparing that scouting report, but that’s not how May is wired.

“That’s Coach Knight’s influence,” Babrick said. “What Coach Knight used to say is, ‘It's not the will to win, it's the will to prepare to win.’ That’s what Coach Knight taught all of us.”