Jordan Hulls' IU basketball homecoming an opportunity he 'just couldn't pass up.'

For the first time since he can remember, Jordan Hulls isn't preparing to play basketball. After a Mr. Basketball career at Bloomington South, four years at IU and nine more playing professionally in Europe, it's an adjustment. Sometimes, Mike Woodson's most recent hire forgets he's in a different stage of life, and it briefly crosses his mind he should be working on his ballhandling or getting shots up.

Then he remembers he's not a player anymore. He's the Hoosiers' recruiting coordinator, tasked in part with using the knowledge and connections he built up over the past 14 years to find players like himself: under the radar of many of the country's top programs, but possessing the basketball knowledge and skill to contribute.

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“The biggest things that I can bring (are) just being from the state, being able to connect with different high school coaches that I’ve met through not just my playing days, just overall," he said. "I felt like I’ve done a good job networking that way when I ran my own training business and stuff like that. So just bringing that to this state and trying to keep building that. You can always get better at that. And then also just my nine years of playing, and then having the success over there that I did and learning different styles and being able to adjust. And also just relating to players and how they work."

It wasn't an easy decision. Hulls accepted the job in May while finishing up what turned out to be his final season in Germany. He planned to play another two or three years before the offer came along.

He thought about it, and how taking the job would allow him to move back home. He would be back with his family. His three kids could be closer to their grandparents.

"For me it was something (that) if I was going to give it up, it would have to be for a situation to come back home," he said. "That’s really the only way that I’d ever do that, and after going through the process and doing my research and talking to the coaches and other people to figure out if this was really something I wanted to get into, for me it was something that I just couldn’t pass up.”

So he retired from playing and came back to Bloomington to work a job for which he was qualified but had no experience. In high school, he committed to IU two weeks after the Hoosiers offered, so he couldn't draw much from his own recruiting experience. He had friends whose processes were more extensive, so he's used what he remembers from them.

There's also the issue of how much recruiting has changed since he was in high school. Name, image and likeness (NIL) didn't exist for athletes when he was choosing a college. Neither did the current state of the transfer portal. In the almost two months since returning, Hulls has picked the brains of IU's coaching staff, trying to glean anything he can.

Over the weekend, he was applying all of it, knowledge old and new, at the Charlie Hughes Shootout in Carmel. He watched for qualities that don't always show up on film: how a player interacted with his teammates, if he plays under control and handles the ball well, how his fundamentals look up close. Having played nine years in four countries, Hulls has seen a lot of basketball and had a lot of teammates. It's culminated with him applying his experience in a new setting.

"For me I think it’s paying attention to the details and those were the things that really helped me personally," he said. "Just staying the course and knowing that I was doing the right things."