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Ross Bjork calls Jake Diebler promotion ‘no-brainer’
After current but outgoing Ohio State Athletic Director Gene Smith fired Chris Holtmann midseason, incoming Buckeyes AD Ross Bjork led the search for the school’s next men’s basketball coach.
He wound up promoting interim head coach Jake Diebler, who turned around Ohio State’s season with an 8-3 record down the stretch and, at one point, got the Buckeyes on the NCAA Tournament bubble.
Bjork reaffirmed his decision this week during an interview with Big Ten Network.
“Really if you look at Jake’s history, being an Ohio guy — that means a lot,” Bjork said. “Every time I kept checking sort of the recruiting landscape, I’d run into people that would say, ‘Oh, Coach Diebler has deep ties.’ Whether it’s the state of Ohio, whether it’s AAU basketball, when he was at Vanderbilt, he recruited kids at a level that maybe he shouldn’t have.”
At the moment, Bjork serves as Ohio State’s senior advisor for intercollegiate athletics. He officially takes over for Smith on July 1. That will mark the end of Smith’s 19-year Buckeyes tenure.
But because Bjork already made a major coaching hire, his Ohio State timeline has already began. Recruiting success wasn’t the only thing that drew Bjork to Diebler.
“He was making moves in-game to make adjustments that led to victory or led to a close game,” Bjork said. “There’s games maybe that we could have won or should have won, but he made the right adjustments down the stretch, and I was really impressed with his in-game acumen.”
Diebler’s first six wins as interim head coach came against Matt Painter (Purdue), Tom Izzo (Michigan State), Fred Hoiberg (Nebraska), Juwan Howard (Michigan), Steve Pikiell (Rutgers) and Fran McCaffery (Iowa). Plus, he had Brad Underwood (Illinois) on the ropes in the Big Ten Tournament.
Painter is a five-time Big Ten Coach of the Year. Izzo has won a national championship. Hoiberg was the co-Big Ten Coach of the Year and also coached the NBA’s Chicago Bulls before his run at Nebraska. Howard was the AP Coach of the Year when he led Michigan to the Elite Eight in 2020-21. Pikiell, McCaffery and Underwood have been at the helm of their current Big Ten schools since at least 2017, and McCaffery hasn’t held a non-head-coaching role this century.
Then Diebler piloted the Buckeyes to the NIT quarterfinals. The fact that his squad even wanted to play in the 32-team postseason tournament after falling short of March Madness is a testament to the culture Diebler facilitated last season.
“The togetherness of the team that he brought to the dance floor was about culture, energy, chemistry, relatability to the players,” Bjork said. “So every time we checked him against other candidates, we just kept coming back and saying ‘This is a no-brainer.'”
Bjork added: “And then you would take the fan response. Every time we played in the Schottenstein Center, [he] got a standing ovation. … The whole place would go crazy.”
Bjork and Ohio State also strongly considered Dusty May, who most notably led Florida Atlantic to the Final Four during the 2023 NCAA Tournament. Now, May is the head coach at Michigan.
Inevitably, May and Diebler will be compared over the next five years, or more.
Although the promotion of Diebler didn’t guarantee roster continuity — five Buckeyes players transferred away this offseason, including two starters — the 37-year-old has wasted no time putting his recruiting chops on display.
Diebler landed a pair of former top-20 overall prospects from the 2023 class in the portal: center Aaron Bradshaw from Kentucky and forward Sean Stewart from Duke. Those two are among the four transfers Ohio State has gained in the portal this offseason, all of whom may start in 2024-25.
Diebler also earned a commitment from four-star Cleveland (Ohio) Garfield Heights point guard Marcus Johnson, the On3 Industry Ranking’s No. 22 overall prospect in the 2026 class — a sign of what could be ahead for the first-time head coach, particularly when it comes to in-state recruiting.
“The Diebler name in the state of Ohio means a lot,” Bjork said. “It could have been easy to ‘win the press conference nationally.’ We won the press conference locally, and then some.
“And, to me, that matters more long-term than sort of a flash.”
Counting Down
Buckeyes vs. Akron: 83 days
Buckeyes vs. Michigan: 174 days
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