Ferrell set an IU single-season record with 220 attempted 3-pointers, which he made at a 40 percent rate. No other Big Ten player attempted more long-distance shots, and only 43 players nationally did so.
When he heard of the record, Ferrell said he couldn’t believe it.
“Is that actually true?” he asked. “OK. I didn’t know that, no.”
Throughout the 2013-14 campaign, the Hoosiers struggled to create ball movement on offense. Crean has often said a lack of players with true scoring ability stagnated his team’s offense, which often left Ferrell as its only option.
“We didn’t have the shooters,” Crean said. “We didn’t have the makers on the court, and he had to take those because we needed to make shots ... to me, we had to do what we had to do.”
Both coach and player seemed to be in agreement that Ferrell’s 3-point attempts would drop this season but differed on what that meant for his role in the offense.
With a handful of talented shooters in place around him, Ferrell said his responsibilities for the upcoming season will focus more heavily on creating open shots for his teammates rather than himself.
“Coach is going to make you do it or you won’t even be in the game,” he said. “Coach is always talking about moving the ball. You just have to let the offense flow for you. You just can’t force it, really.”
Crean, who has praised Ferrell for his versatility on both ends of the floor, said restricting the junior guard’s offensive ?capabilities would simply remove a scoring threat from the floor.
“I think, if you’ve looked at our teams, ours here and mine in the past (at Marquette), we never have a point guard that’s just a facilitator,” he said. “If the point guard is just a facilitator, we better be really, really good at the other positions and be able to get a lot of scoring.”
No matter his eventual role in the offense, Ferrell is almost certain to have some of the scoring load taken off him by an influx of offensive talent that have already caught the attention of Ferrell and other teammates.
Freshmen guards James Blackmon Jr. and Robert Johnson were highly touted recruits with the ability to shoot from distance. ?Redshirt junior Nick Zeisloft was known for his outside shooting at Illinois State before transferring to IU.
Freshmen forwards Tim Priller and Max Hoetzel bring long-range shooting, if little promise of playing time.
Ferrell said he was willing to adapt to whatever role Crean wants him to play in the offense, though Crean said he doesn’t want his preseason All-Big Ten point guard becoming one-dimensional.
“We’ve always had scoring from our guards, and we’ve always had it from our point guard,” Crean said. “We never want anybody at the point spot who you don’t have to guard multiple ways but at the same time can’t find a way to hurt you.”
