Gene Keady is wearing a black Nike polo shirt with a gold swoosh on the right and the words "Purdue Basketball" stitched on the left. Atop his head is a matching Boilermakers ball cap. The 87-year-old former Purdue coach is decked out in Arizona where his beloved team is preparing for the Final Four, a feat he never accomplished in his 25 years at the helm.

And yet, in some ways, Keady is one of the coaches in this weekend's Final Four. He is, after all, the man who Purdue coach Matt Painter learned so much from, not only as a player but as an associate coach sitting next to Keady on the Purdue bench before he retired in 2005 and left Painter in charge.

"I'm very proud of Matt Painter and the team, and I'm so happy to be part of it," Keady told IndyStar Friday. "It's really rewarding because it means he listened, he worked hard ... and he knows what the right thing to do is."

Keady has been traveling with Purdue through its NCAA tournament run and was in Detroit for the Elite Eight to witness the team make it to the Final Four for the first time since coach Lee Rose led Purdue to the semifinals in 1980. That was the year Keady took the reins of the team after Rose left for a fledgling South Florida coaching job."I was so happy and proud and wanted to be part of it," Keady said. "I'm not sure there are enough words to describe how happy I was for everybody, because Matt Painter is one of my former players, and he's just a guy that does things right."

After the win against Tennessee, Purdue's 7-4 Zach Edey cut down a piece of the net, without a ladder, and gave it to Keady, a nod to his role in the team's place in history.

Keady said he had no idea Edey was going to do it. "That was very surprising, and I was happy about it," he said. "The fact that they thought about it was enough for me."

While Keady declined to make a prediction for Purdue's matchup Saturday against NC State ("No. I don't do that," he told IndyStar), he will talk about why the team has had such great success.

"Well, they have good ingredients, they have a big center, they have good shooters, and they play great team defense," he said. "So, they've got all the ingredients to go all the way."

'Of course, I wanted to go as head coach'

While Keady never made it to the Final Four at Purdue, he did make it to the Final Four once in his coaching career, as a 41-year-old assistant to Eddie Sutton at Arkansas in 1978. But, he said, nobody seems to remember that. They mostly remember him as the legendary Purdue coach.

In his 25 years in West Lafayette, Keady led his team to the NCAA tournament 17 times, the Elite Eight twice, won six Big Ten titles and 512 games. He was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 2023.

When asked if he had any regrets that he didn't win a title or make it to the Final Four as a head coach, Keady said, "Of course, I wanted to go as a head coach, but didn't make it. So that makes you feel like you're kind of a failure, but by the same token, my kids graduated and it's not a failure."

Keady emphasized just how tough it is to get to a Final Four."Oh, it's very, very difficult because you just, you've got to have the kids with the right attitude about what it takes, you've got to have guys that understand that this is very difficult, you've got to stay focused," he said. "There's a lot of ingredients. You just don't think it's just one thing. It has to fall in place."

If Purdue ends up winning its first NCAA title, Keady said it's hard to put into words what it will mean to him."Well, it's a lot because one of my former players (Painter) and students is the big key to it," he said. 'So, I'll be very happy and proud." Follow IndyStar sports reporter Dana Benbow on X: @DanaBenbow. Reach her via email: dbenbow@indystar.com.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Gene Keady's Purdue never made Final Four. But this one belongs to him