Jake Diebler has found his associate head coach.
Joel Justus, who helped lead N.C. State to a Final Four berth this season, officially joined Ohio State’s coaching staff on Monday.
Welcome to Buckeye Nation coach Joel Justus
— Ohio State Hoops (@OhioStateHoops) April 8, 2024
Ohio State mens basketball head coach Jake Diebler has announced the hiring of @CoachJustusNCSU as associate head coach. Justus joins the program after a Final Four run on staff at NC State.
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“Joel is someone I have known for a while and I’m excited to have him join our staff,” Diebler said in a statement. “He is a well-rounded coach with great experience in the development and recruiting spaces, while winning everywhere he’s been. His vision for building a program and developing a winning culture is something I was looking for and I can’t wait for him to get started.”
Justus joins the Buckeyes after two seasons as an assistant coach at N.C. State. He previously spent one year at Arizona State after a seven-year stint at Kentucky as an assistant to John Calipari, who was reportedly interested in Ohio State’s head coaching job before the Buckeyes promoted Diebler.
A guard at UNC Wilmington from 2000-04, Justus started his coaching career at Elon University, spending four years there as an assistant coach. He then became a head coach in the high school ranks for six years, coaching at Woodbury Forest High School (Virginia) for four years and Davidson Day School (North Carolina) for two years before going to Kentucky, where he started as director of analytics in 2014 and was special assistant to the head coach for one year before being promoted to the on-court coaching staff in 2016.
Justus is the second official hire for Diebler’s coaching staff, joining Dave Dickerson, who was previously Ohio State’s associate head coach from 2010-17 before a six-year run as the head coach at USC Upstate.
With two coaching spots still to fill, Ohio State is expected to have a brand new staff of assistant coaches in 2024-25 after promoting Diebler from associate head coach.
