New Georgia State coach Jon Cremins’ model is exactly who you would think

As Jon Cremins grew up in Roswell and spent time around his uncle’s basketball program at Georgia Tech, he said he heard a message spoken to him by Bobby Cremins’ players.

“As soon as I can remember, as long as I could, his players would always come up to me and say, ‘Hey, you don’t realize what your uncle has done for me on and off the court,’” Jon Cremins told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Saturday. “That always just resonated to me. I was like, ‘Man, I want people to say that about myself.’”

Friday, he received his greatest opportunity to fulfill that purpose when the Vanderbilt assistant coach accepted Georgia State’s offer to be its next head basketball coach. Cremins, a Blessed Trinity High graduate, was at the Final Four in Indianapolis when Georgia State AD Charlie Cobb told him that the deal had been finalized.

“The best news I’ve ever gotten,” he said.

It has been more than a quarter-century since Bobby Cremins last called the shots for the Yellow Jackets, but his influence remains. The court at Tech’s McCamish Pavilion bears his name. When Scott Cross was introduced as Tech’s new coach in March, he made sure to mention that he had grown up watching Cremins’ teams and had spoken with him after taking the job.

Cross is the fifth coach hired by Tech since Cremins’ departure in 2000 to try to match his surpassing standards — 10 NCAA Tournament trips, 3 ACC titles, the first Final Four appearance in school history, thousands of electrifying moments at the old Alexander Memorial Coliseum. The memory, not only of his greatness but also his decency and humility, remains indelible.

The influence of Uncle Bobby, as Jon calls him, will now extend to Georgia State’s downtown campus a couple miles south of Tech. The younger Cremins was not only a witness to how his uncle (and godfather) operated at Tech, but he later worked on his staff at the College of Charleston, where the elder Cremins was head coach for six seasons after leaving Tech (2006-12).

“With him, it’s being genuine, truly caring for someone,” he said. “He’s just someone that genuinely wants the best for everyone he meets. He wants to help them reach their potential and wants them to be successful.”

In a day where players will transfer even when they’re perfectly content in order to pursue more lucrative name, image and likeness deals or to play on bigger stages, investing in relationships seems a quaint notion. But Cremins would tell you it brings returns.

Cremins comes from Vanderbilt coach Mark Byington’s staff, which in two years produced back-to-back NCAA Tournament trips after the Commodores hadn’t advanced to the tournament since 2017. He was also an assistant coach to Byington at his two previous successful stops, at Georgia Southern and James Madison. Byington and Jon Cremins first worked together at Charleston, where Byington was an assistant coach, and he himself learned from Bobby Cremins.

“That’s why he’s been so successful,” Jon Cremins said of Byington. “That’s exactly what we’re going to do at Georgia State. I can’t wait to be around our guys, pour into them, help them develop on and off the court. Just excited to get to work.”

That isn’t the only part of Cremins’ plan, of course. As Cobb interviewed candidates — he said there were 14 initial videoconference interviews and then seven in-person meetings — he said that what made Cremins emerge as the top candidate was his hand in the success of two rival Sun Belt schools (James Madison and Georgia Southern) and a model based on analytics-based player evaluation and skill development.

“It was kind of a new approach for us, something that everybody in the room bought into,” Cobb told the AJC. “It was a pretty solid thing.”

Cremins’ record of recruiting success overall, and particularly in metro Atlanta and the state of Georgia, boosted his candidacy as well.

“Really prepared for the moment,” Cobb said of Cremins. “Just trying to find the right moment.”

It’s a big moment. Cremins, 40 and engaged to be married this summer, follows Jonas Hayes, the former Georgia Bulldog who could not continue the momentum created by Ron Hunter and then Rob Lanier (nine consecutive winning seasons and four NCAA appearances). The Panthers recorded four consecutive losing seasons under Hayes’ leadership, prompting his dismissal after the season.

Cremins was already at work Friday, firming up his staff and evaluating potential transfer portal targets.