A couch coach's take on our current issues

[Boilpotato]

The better JHS is, the worse (in a sense) it is for IU. Goodbye?

But if he wasn’t carrying the weight along with TJD, *then* where are we, right now?

1-3 in conference play?

Am I caller 15?

 

[Radio Zero]

1-3 in conference play?

Am I caller 15?

Sod off.

But yeah, something like that.

 

[RegionHoosiers]

Last year's identity towards the end of the season seemed to be tough defense and a lot of pick and rolls with X and TJD. The Achilles' heal was that no one could hit open 3's. This year the shooting has improved although I'm not sure what they are doing on offense. The real difference is the drop off on defense. How much of that is on Woodson and how much is on X and Race (along with TJD to some extent) being hurt?

 

[ams66]

Kopp and Stewart could hit 3s last year, percentage-wise. The problem was that they couldn't seem to do it in the moments when we really needed one. Or so was my impression.

 

[HoosierJimbo89]

It appears Woody's offense is an NBA/dribble drive type of offense. If you have the personnel for that, which would be people that can get their own bucket off the dribble and shoot, great and it can be deadly. Before X got injured, X and JHS were really the only players on the roster that fit a dribble drive offense: maybe TG and JB to an extent. Now, IU is trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Oddly enough, IU has put up 90 the past couple of games. But, it hasn't been pretty for the most part.

The defense, turnovers/sloppy passes, and lack of rebounding are driving me nuts. This is why IU is losing. Defense, taking care of the ball, and rebounding are things that any player of any skill level can do. There is absolutely no excuse.

The team looks gassed and overwhelmed to me. If I had to guess why, it is because of the injuries. X, Race, and TJD were the main players coming back, and they are all injured to some extent. As expected, the backups are not producing as much, and morale has probable taken a hit. JHS is the only freshman consistently producing. There is definitely a personnel issue right now: while I get it, I am a little upset because it doesn't need to be as big of an issue. We don't have much of a Plan B, C, D, and E.

 

[IUNorth]

It appears Woody's offense is an NBA/dribble drive type of offense. If you have the personnel for that, which would be people that can get their own bucket off the dribble and shoot, great and it can be deadly. Before X got injured, X and JHS were really the only players on the roster that fit a dribble drive offense: maybe TG and JB to an extent. Now, IU is trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Oddly enough, IU has put up 90 the past couple of games. But, it hasn't been pretty for the most part.

The defense, turnovers/sloppy passes, and lack of rebounding are driving me nuts. This is why IU is losing. Defense, taking care of the ball, and rebounding are things that any player of any skill level can do. There is absolutely no excuse.

The team looks gassed and overwhelmed to me. If I had to guess why, it is because of the injuries. X, Race, and TJD were the main players coming back, and they are all injured to some extent. As expected, the backups are not producing as much, and moral has probable taken a hit. JHS is the only freshman consistently producing. There is definitely a personnel issue right now: while I get it, I am a little upset because it doesn't need to be as big of an issue. We don't have much of a Plan B, C, D, and E.

Can't disagree with any of this. And you could be right. Our players outside of X, Race, and TJD probably are a little rattled right now. That's natural, and would happen to any program losing 2 of its top players, both seniors, and your best player losing some of his explosiveness. But that's where good programs end up righting the ship...the players that end up filling the holes have solid, fundamental aspects of their program to rely on. Our guys rely on players. Purdue and Wisconsin guys rely on their system, their style, their comfort executing within very well practiced methods. Should Loyer and Smith be as good as they're playing right now? Should Ethan Mortan even be in a B10 uniform? Should Connor Essegian be pushing for double digit scoring nights, for one of the better teams in the B10? Those teams lose guys like Ivey and Davis, and continue thriving. Because it isn't about the players, its the program.

 

[HoosierJimbo89]

Can't disagree with any of this. And you could be right. Our players outside of X, Race, and TJD probably are a little rattled right now. That's natural, and would happen to any program losing 2 of its top players, both seniors, and your best player losing some of his explosiveness. But that's where good programs end up righting the ship...the players that end up filling the holes have solid, fundamental aspects of their program to rely on. Our guys rely on players. Purdue and Wisconsin guys rely on their system, their style, their comfort executing within very well practiced methods. Should Loyer and Smith be as good as they're playing right now? Should Ethan Mortan even be in a B10 uniform? Should Connor Essegian be pushing for double digit scoring nights, for one of the better teams in the B10? Those teams lose guys like Ivey and Davis, and continue thriving. Because it isn't about the players, its the program.

While there is a ceiling on Wisconsin (outside of Bo Ryan) and PU, they are consistently solid. Gene Keady is the man most responsible for turning Big Ten basketball into a football game, and he did it for a reason: the Pistons can beat Michael Jordan when they are fouling the crap out of him. What else can a program that historically does not get the best talent do? Control the things everybody can control (effort, attitude, turnovers, defense, rebounding) and find some niche skill like height and shooting. Painter has made his living as of late off of big men and shooting and being able to game plan for them. However, at the end of the day, you still need the best Jimmy's and Joe's.

IU is a program that can recruit at a high level, bring in the best coaches, and effort, attitude, turnovers, defense, and rebounding should never be an issue. Yet, here we are. Matta and Izzo never had much of an issue with Painter, which wasn't an accident.

 

[aajohn2000]

For months and months, I've been harping on our main problems being that our offense is bad, and that we aren't capable of stopping good opposing wings. I now think its much more widespread and foundational than that. I think the individual talents that X provided, that a fully healthy TJD provided, that Race provided, masked some of the foundational issues in our program. And now that a couple of those guys are out completely, and TJD is now a little less explosive, the true issues are becoming more clear.

I think Woodson is coaching from a reactive position right now, instead of establishing things in his program that will allow his teams to dictate, instead of react.

Defensively...we're now scrambling and running zones, and presses. Gone are the high ball pressure man to man days we've seen more than we haven't since he arrived. That tells me that it was more of a product of player personnel, and gameday talking points, than it was a foundational thing that he drilled into his players early and often. So we're reacting to our situation and to our opponents, instead of having something galvanizing to rely on. I played college ball nearly 30 years ago...and to this day, I still remember, hear, feel the words "no middle" when I watch basketball games at any level. Watching my son play HS ball, is actually uncomfortable at times, because their program emphasizes funneling people middle, so they put their low legs up when defending on the wing. So almost every time my son is defending someone on the wing, I have the gut reaction that he's doing it wrong. Every single practice, every workout, every game of my college career, not getting beat middle was demanded. We did shell drills, 1 on 1 and 2 on 2 checkout drills, we ran for it, we got kicked out of practices for it, we were benched because of it. As a result, we rarely ever got beat middle. We dictated where the other teams were able to run their offense. And we were nearly always ranked in the top 10 percent nationally in most defensive stats. I see absolutely zero tenets in IU's defensive efforts that show any "no middle" type foundational things being taught. And obviously it doesn't have to be "no middle". My sons team is actually pretty solid defensively. They have more help in the middle of the court, they're good at packing the help lines and forcing other teams into turnovers and shooting from the perimeter. Syracuse famously runs a 2-3 zone. Bad 2-3 zones, that are thrown out there by coaches that are REACTING to other teams, are about the worst defense you can possibly run. You can't rebound out of them well, you give up tons of open looks, etc... But when you recruit to it, practice it every day, demand that its played correctly...well we've all seen what it can do. It ends up dictating how the other team plays offense.

Offensively...I just can't stomach our main offense being what we inevitably end up running as games come down the stretch. We've seen different things from game to game, I often reference the Nebraska game, as an example. We even see dramatic differences within games. Again...this leads me to think we don't have a set offense, or set groups of plays that Woody works on, relentlessly, every single day. Referencing my college days again, I can still vividly remember our 3 out/2 in, high low oriented offense. We had the base offense, and we had a series of odd and even numbered plays that we'd run. I could diagram all of them still to this day. And we were all so versed in them, that most of us knew what versions of the offense we were going to run before our coach even called anything, based off how the game was going. My point from the references to my college days, obviously, is not to compare myself to IU players. In fact, we were about as far from that as a team could get. Our tallest starter was 6'5, and he was a wing. Our post players were both 6'3. Yet we won over 60% of our games, basically being smaller, and often times less athletic, at most positions. We dictated how the game was going to be played. As evidenced by losing nearly 40% of the time, it didn't always equal a win. But against the teams that were far bigger and just better, we rarely ever got blown out, and beat a good amount of them on a regular basis. And we rarely, if ever, lost to teams that were similar to us size/talent wise.

I don't think Woody is doing anything like this at IU. I think really good programs, that are solid year in and year out, are doing these sorts of things. And almost invariably, it shows up as games go on. Most teams end up dictating offensively and defensively to us how the game is going to be played. And our talent isn't elite enough to overcome it. So while our talent level allows for flashes of brilliant play, basically without fail, we end up regressing back. Even in the Xavier and UNC games, we didn't put either of those teams away, despite playing really well for a good chunk of those games. And those are our two shining examples of what we can be, when playing our "best". Outside those games, are there ANY games during Woody's tenure that we were good start to finish?

He's not teaching them anything they can rely on when times get tough. And it shows. And it sucks, because we got some tough times ahead.

Damn dude. That's the best "we aren't getting good coaching post" I've read. Well done.

 

[Willdog7]

For months and months, I've been harping on our main problems being that our offense is bad, and that we aren't capable of stopping good opposing wings. I now think its much more widespread and foundational than that. I think the individual talents that X provided, that a fully healthy TJD provided, that Race provided, masked some of the foundational issues in our program. And now that a couple of those guys are out completely, and TJD is now a little less explosive, the true issues are becoming more clear.

I think Woodson is coaching from a reactive position right now, instead of establishing things in his program that will allow his teams to dictate, instead of react.

Defensively...we're now scrambling and running zones, and presses. Gone are the high ball pressure man to man days we've seen more than we haven't since he arrived. That tells me that it was more of a product of player personnel, and gameday talking points, than it was a foundational thing that he drilled into his players early and often. So we're reacting to our situation and to our opponents, instead of having something galvanizing to rely on. I played college ball nearly 30 years ago...and to this day, I still remember, hear, feel the words "no middle" when I watch basketball games at any level. Watching my son play HS ball, is actually uncomfortable at times, because their program emphasizes funneling people middle, so they put their low legs up when defending on the wing. So almost every time my son is defending someone on the wing, I have the gut reaction that he's doing it wrong. Every single practice, every workout, every game of my college career, not getting beat middle was demanded. We did shell drills, 1 on 1 and 2 on 2 checkout drills, we ran for it, we got kicked out of practices for it, we were benched because of it. As a result, we rarely ever got beat middle. We dictated where the other teams were able to run their offense. And we were nearly always ranked in the top 10 percent nationally in most defensive stats. I see absolutely zero tenets in IU's defensive efforts that show any "no middle" type foundational things being taught. And obviously it doesn't have to be "no middle". My sons team is actually pretty solid defensively. They have more help in the middle of the court, they're good at packing the help lines and forcing other teams into turnovers and shooting from the perimeter. Syracuse famously runs a 2-3 zone. Bad 2-3 zones, that are thrown out there by coaches that are REACTING to other teams, are about the worst defense you can possibly run. You can't rebound out of them well, you give up tons of open looks, etc... But when you recruit to it, practice it every day, demand that its played correctly...well we've all seen what it can do. It ends up dictating how the other team plays offense.

Offensively...I just can't stomach our main offense being what we inevitably end up running as games come down the stretch. We've seen different things from game to game, I often reference the Nebraska game, as an example. We even see dramatic differences within games. Again...this leads me to think we don't have a set offense, or set groups of plays that Woody works on, relentlessly, every single day. Referencing my college days again, I can still vividly remember our 3 out/2 in, high low oriented offense. We had the base offense, and we had a series of odd and even numbered plays that we'd run. I could diagram all of them still to this day. And we were all so versed in them, that most of us knew what versions of the offense we were going to run before our coach even called anything, based off how the game was going. My point from the references to my college days, obviously, is not to compare myself to IU players. In fact, we were about as far from that as a team could get. Our tallest starter was 6'5, and he was a wing. Our post players were both 6'3. Yet we won over 60% of our games, basically being smaller, and often times less athletic, at most positions. We dictated how the game was going to be played. As evidenced by losing nearly 40% of the time, it didn't always equal a win. But against the teams that were far bigger and just better, we rarely ever got blown out, and beat a good amount of them on a regular basis. And we rarely, if ever, lost to teams that were similar to us size/talent wise.

I don't think Woody is doing anything like this at IU. I think really good programs, that are solid year in and year out, are doing these sorts of things. And almost invariably, it shows up as games go on. Most teams end up dictating offensively and defensively to us how the game is going to be played. And our talent isn't elite enough to overcome it. So while our talent level allows for flashes of brilliant play, basically without fail, we end up regressing back. Even in the Xavier and UNC games, we didn't put either of those teams away, despite playing really well for a good chunk of those games. And those are our two shining examples of what we can be, when playing our "best". Outside those games, are there ANY games during Woody's tenure that we were good start to finish?

He's not teaching them anything they can rely on when times get tough. And it shows. And it sucks, because we got some tough times ahead.

I agree with a lot of what you r saying. Let him get his players in then judge. Remember the player's hv change since u played. it's more about getting into the NBA and making money.

 

[Willdog7]

While there is a ceiling on Wisconsin (outside of Bo Ryan) and PU, they are consistently solid. Gene Keady is the man most responsible for turning Big Ten basketball into a football game, and he did it for a reason: the Pistons can beat Michael Jordan when they are fouling the crap out of him. What else can a program that historically does not get the best talent do? Control the things everybody can control (effort, attitude, turnovers, defense, rebounding) and find some niche skill like height and shooting. Painter has made his living as of late off of big men and shooting and being able to game plan for them. However, at the end of the day, you still need the best Jimmy's and Joe's.

IU is a program that can recruit at a high level, bring in the best coaches, and effort, attitude, turnovers, defense, and rebounding should never be an issue. Yet, here we are. Matta and Izzo never had much of an issue with Painter, which wasn't an accident.

Do you IU TO TURN INTO A FOOTBALL, WRESTLING SCHOOL. who will win a b10 tourney maybe but can't compete with the quicker, taller BB schools for a national title? When has a b10 team won a nat-title?

 

[B1G_Fan]

I agree with a lot of what you r saying. Let him get his players in then judge. Remember the player's hv change since u played. it's more about getting into the NBA and making money.

8 of the 13 players are “his” players. TJD (our best player) isn’t “his”.

 

[Zeke7]

Remember the talk before the season how we would go 12 players deep. Man how bad can Banks and Ducncomb be right now if they cannot even sniff the floor with Race out. I mean Geronimo is playing over both of them and he is pretty bad.

I really don't understand why both hasn't got a chance ! I thought both Players had some good Minutes early in the Season! Better give Them a chance cause next Year We will be wishing We had Banks and Duncomb and probably Gunn too!

 

[Lucy01]

The lack of development, with our players, is alarming.

That’s because we do not have a developer.

 

[8Stars5Banners]

I really don't understand why both hasn't got a chance ! I thought both Players had some good Minutes early in the Season! Better give Them a chance cause next Year We will be wishing We had Banks and Duncomb and probably Gunn too!

We‘ll never long for Duncomb

 

[TR32]

I think the individual talents that X provided, that a fully healthy TJD provided, that Race provided, masked some of the foundational issues in our program. And now that a couple of those guys are out completely, and TJD is now a little less explosive, the true issues are becoming more clear.

I believe to have success with an NBA offense in college you need superior talent and superior athletes. But even Penny has had very high level talent and still not very good success. Like you said we now see the true issues and without these guys next year it will only get worse. College is not the NBA but we have an NBA coach. It will likely not end well. Without X, TJD, and JHS next year there will be nobody who can create on their own which is basically what these guys all do.

Agreed. Whenever I clamor that we "have no offense" this, and the OP's post is what I mean. All the highly ranked recruits love to hear that a coach will let them "operate", but year over year it offers hits and misses instead of constant success.
Kentucky is by far the best example. It's like constantly shoveling coal in the engine instead of having constant dependable power.

 

[go_iu]

For months and months, I've been harping on our main problems being that our offense is bad, and that we aren't capable of stopping good opposing wings. I now think its much more widespread and foundational than that. I think the individual talents that X provided, that a fully healthy TJD provided, that Race provided, masked some of the foundational issues in our program. And now that a couple of those guys are out completely, and TJD is now a little less explosive, the true issues are becoming more clear.

I think Woodson is coaching from a reactive position right now, instead of establishing things in his program that will allow his teams to dictate, instead of react.

Defensively...we're now scrambling and running zones, and presses. Gone are the high ball pressure man to man days we've seen more than we haven't since he arrived. That tells me that it was more of a product of player personnel, and gameday talking points, than it was a foundational thing that he drilled into his players early and often. So we're reacting to our situation and to our opponents, instead of having something galvanizing to rely on. I played college ball nearly 30 years ago...and to this day, I still remember, hear, feel the words "no middle" when I watch basketball games at any level. Watching my son play HS ball, is actually uncomfortable at times, because their program emphasizes funneling people middle, so they put their low legs up when defending on the wing. So almost every time my son is defending someone on the wing, I have the gut reaction that he's doing it wrong. Every single practice, every workout, every game of my college career, not getting beat middle was demanded. We did shell drills, 1 on 1 and 2 on 2 checkout drills, we ran for it, we got kicked out of practices for it, we were benched because of it. As a result, we rarely ever got beat middle. We dictated where the other teams were able to run their offense. And we were nearly always ranked in the top 10 percent nationally in most defensive stats. I see absolutely zero tenets in IU's defensive efforts that show any "no middle" type foundational things being taught. And obviously it doesn't have to be "no middle". My sons team is actually pretty solid defensively. They have more help in the middle of the court, they're good at packing the help lines and forcing other teams into turnovers and shooting from the perimeter. Syracuse famously runs a 2-3 zone. Bad 2-3 zones, that are thrown out there by coaches that are REACTING to other teams, are about the worst defense you can possibly run. You can't rebound out of them well, you give up tons of open looks, etc... But when you recruit to it, practice it every day, demand that its played correctly...well we've all seen what it can do. It ends up dictating how the other team plays offense.

Offensively...I just can't stomach our main offense being what we inevitably end up running as games come down the stretch. We've seen different things from game to game, I often reference the Nebraska game, as an example. We even see dramatic differences within games. Again...this leads me to think we don't have a set offense, or set groups of plays that Woody works on, relentlessly, every single day. Referencing my college days again, I can still vividly remember our 3 out/2 in, high low oriented offense. We had the base offense, and we had a series of odd and even numbered plays that we'd run. I could diagram all of them still to this day. And we were all so versed in them, that most of us knew what versions of the offense we were going to run before our coach even called anything, based off how the game was going. My point from the references to my college days, obviously, is not to compare myself to IU players. In fact, we were about as far from that as a team could get. Our tallest starter was 6'5, and he was a wing. Our post players were both 6'3. Yet we won over 60% of our games, basically being smaller, and often times less athletic, at most positions. We dictated how the game was going to be played. As evidenced by losing nearly 40% of the time, it didn't always equal a win. But against the teams that were far bigger and just better, we rarely ever got blown out, and beat a good amount of them on a regular basis. And we rarely, if ever, lost to teams that were similar to us size/talent wise.

I don't think Woody is doing anything like this at IU. I think really good programs, that are solid year in and year out, are doing these sorts of things. And almost invariably, it shows up as games go on. Most teams end up dictating offensively and defensively to us how the game is going to be played. And our talent isn't elite enough to overcome it. So while our talent level allows for flashes of brilliant play, basically without fail, we end up regressing back. Even in the Xavier and UNC games, we didn't put either of those teams away, despite playing really well for a good chunk of those games. And those are our two shining examples of what we can be, when playing our "best". Outside those games, are there ANY games during Woody's tenure that we were good start to finish?

He's not teaching them anything they can rely on when times get tough. And it shows. And it sucks, because we got some tough times ahead.

I think a lot of it is there are a bunch of players that should not be here or be here now, Trayce, Race, Kopp, Xavier, should not be in college anymore.

We sold our soul on the idea of an extremely experienced version of them would work, but there isn't enough talent or basketball IQ there to compete in B10, and they don't improve

Leal and Geronimo should probably in the MVC if they ever want to play. Galloway, I think is a good role guy. but. it is basically the same team as last year. If JHS stays and Malik stays, and we get more traction on recruiting, then we have something, but that is unlikely to happen.

This was really screwed up roster management because of NIL, and who is gonna be the dick and tell them they have no chance of going to the NBA and don't stay and don't take the money. But it gets down to do we want to win? Lots of guys here that should not be here or should have been gone, but I do think Woodson is too much of a nice guy to say hey we want to win and kick them off. I fear next year will be brutal, Woodson's ass on fire, no recruiting, and then start from scratch again. Starting from from scratch should have started with that and recruiting over Archie's gang. Archie made the same mistake on re-recruiting Crean guys

 

[kkott]

Kopp and Stewart could hit 3s last year, percentage-wise. The problem was that they couldn't seem to do it in the moments when we really needed one. Or so was my impression.

right now as a team I think we're shooting as good as our best shooter from last year so the shooting has improved for sure.

 

[Willdog7]

8 of the 13 players are “his” players. TJD (our best player) isn’t “his”.

The 4 Freshman and Bates.

 

[Lucy01]

Do you IU TO TURN INTO A FOOTBALL, WRESTLING SCHOOL. who will win a b10 tourney maybe but can't compete with the quicker, taller BB schools for a national title? When has a b10 team won a nat-title?

Dumb

 

[Cavanagh]

The 4 Freshman and Bates.

X Kopp duncomb. All his.

 

[Harpo Marxist]

I think a lot of it is there are a bunch of players that should not be here or be here now, Trayce, Race, Kopp, Xavier, should not be in college anymore.

We sold our soul on the idea of an extremely experienced version of them would work, but there isn't enough talent or basketball IQ there to compete in B10, and they don't improve

Leal and Geronimo should probably in the MVC if they ever want to play. Galloway, I think is a good role guy. but. it is basically the same team as last year. If JHS stays and Malik stays, and we get more traction on recruiting, then we have something, but that is unlikely to happen.

This was really screwed up roster management because of NIL, and who is gonna be the dick and tell them they have no chance of going to the NBA and don't stay and don't take the money. But it gets down to do we want to win? Lots of guys here that should not be here or should have been gone, but I do think Woodson is too much of a nice guy to say hey we want to win and kick them off. I fear next year will be brutal, Woodson's ass on fire, no recruiting, and then start from scratch again. Starting from from scratch should have started with that and recruiting over Archie's gang. Archie made the same mistake on re-recruiting Crean guys

How do you build on recruiting if the head coach appears to be more short term as each year passes? Mention a lack of interior depth (and perimeter for that matter) and the butt hurt brigade comes out to whine about criticism. We have a roster of bodies...but no Steve Eyls or Greg Grahams who can step right in and assume the role of a starter when injuries or other issues demand it. The lack of development with interior players is embarrassingly obvious...and is now routinely exploited by opponents. The discussions about competing against the likes of Kansas or Arizona is so over the top....when IU can't get by Northwestern. Its beginning to look like a continuation of the past two decades....where the conversation gravitates toward "bubble teams". I don't see a coaching staff that is checking even half of the boxes: recruiting the right players, developing depth and roster management. I'm sure that there are other issues as well....like discipline.

 

[B1G_Fan]

The 4 Freshman and Bates.

Are you kidding? XJ, Kopp, and Duncomb.

 

[ams66]

X Kopp duncomb. All his.

Duncomb was recruited by Miller but never played for him.

 

[Cavanagh]

Duncomb was recruited by Miller but never played for him.

So was Gunn.

 

[Boilpotato]

So was Gunn.

Send lawyers , Gunn and Duncomb
The shhirs

So was Gunn.

Send coaches , Gunn and Holcomb
The shit has hit the fan

 

[Willdog7]

X Kopp duncomb. All his.

duncomb is Millers

 

[HoosierJimbo89]

Send lawyers , Gunn and Duncomb
The shhirs


Send coaches , Gunn and Holcomb
The shit has hit the fan

Somebody needs a life and lives rent free here every day, including holidays.

 

[i'vegotwinners]

For months and months, I've been harping on our main problems being that our offense is bad, and that we aren't capable of stopping good opposing wings. I now think its much more widespread and foundational than that. I think the individual talents that X provided, that a fully healthy TJD provided, that Race provided, masked some of the foundational issues in our program. And now that a couple of those guys are out completely, and TJD is now a little less explosive, the true issues are becoming more clear.

I think Woodson is coaching from a reactive position right now, instead of establishing things in his program that will allow his teams to dictate, instead of react.

Defensively...we're now scrambling and running zones, and presses. Gone are the high ball pressure man to man days we've seen more than we haven't since he arrived. That tells me that it was more of a product of player personnel, and gameday talking points, than it was a foundational thing that he drilled into his players early and often. So we're reacting to our situation and to our opponents, instead of having something galvanizing to rely on. I played college ball nearly 30 years ago...and to this day, I still remember, hear, feel the words "no middle" when I watch basketball games at any level. Watching my son play HS ball, is actually uncomfortable at times, because their program emphasizes funneling people middle, so they put their low legs up when defending on the wing. So almost every time my son is defending someone on the wing, I have the gut reaction that he's doing it wrong. Every single practice, every workout, every game of my college career, not getting beat middle was demanded. We did shell drills, 1 on 1 and 2 on 2 checkout drills, we ran for it, we got kicked out of practices for it, we were benched because of it. As a result, we rarely ever got beat middle. We dictated where the other teams were able to run their offense. And we were nearly always ranked in the top 10 percent nationally in most defensive stats. I see absolutely zero tenets in IU's defensive efforts that show any "no middle" type foundational things being taught. And obviously it doesn't have to be "no middle". My sons team is actually pretty solid defensively. They have more help in the middle of the court, they're good at packing the help lines and forcing other teams into turnovers and shooting from the perimeter. Syracuse famously runs a 2-3 zone. Bad 2-3 zones, that are thrown out there by coaches that are REACTING to other teams, are about the worst defense you can possibly run. You can't rebound out of them well, you give up tons of open looks, etc... But when you recruit to it, practice it every day, demand that its played correctly...well we've all seen what it can do. It ends up dictating how the other team plays offense.

Offensively...I just can't stomach our main offense being what we inevitably end up running as games come down the stretch. We've seen different things from game to game, I often reference the Nebraska game, as an example. We even see dramatic differences within games. Again...this leads me to think we don't have a set offense, or set groups of plays that Woody works on, relentlessly, every single day. Referencing my college days again, I can still vividly remember our 3 out/2 in, high low oriented offense. We had the base offense, and we had a series of odd and even numbered plays that we'd run. I could diagram all of them still to this day. And we were all so versed in them, that most of us knew what versions of the offense we were going to run before our coach even called anything, based off how the game was going. My point from the references to my college days, obviously, is not to compare myself to IU players. In fact, we were about as far from that as a team could get. Our tallest starter was 6'5, and he was a wing. Our post players were both 6'3. Yet we won over 60% of our games, basically being smaller, and often times less athletic, at most positions. We dictated how the game was going to be played. As evidenced by losing nearly 40% of the time, it didn't always equal a win. But against the teams that were far bigger and just better, we rarely ever got blown out, and beat a good amount of them on a regular basis. And we rarely, if ever, lost to teams that were similar to us size/talent wise.

I don't think Woody is doing anything like this at IU. I think really good programs, that are solid year in and year out, are doing these sorts of things. And almost invariably, it shows up as games go on. Most teams end up dictating offensively and defensively to us how the game is going to be played. And our talent isn't elite enough to overcome it. So while our talent level allows for flashes of brilliant play, basically without fail, we end up regressing back. Even in the Xavier and UNC games, we didn't put either of those teams away, despite playing really well for a good chunk of those games. And those are our two shining examples of what we can be, when playing our "best". Outside those games, are there ANY games during Woody's tenure that we were good start to finish?

He's not teaching them anything they can rely on when times get tough. And it shows. And it sucks, because we got some tough times ahead.

when the Celtics had Parrish, McHale, and Bird, they masked the weaknesses that not having Parrish, Bird, and McHale, would have exposed.

when the Lakers had Magic, Kareem, and Wilkes, they masked the weaknesses that would have been exposed if all 3 where injured at the same time.

when IU and Knight had Benson, May, and Buckner, in 76, it masked weaknesses that would have been exposed absent having them.

when Ginger and Mary Ann were both on Gilligan's Island, it masked the weaknesses the island would have had without them.

 

[IUNorth]

when the Celtics had Parrish, McHale, and Bird, they masked the weaknesses that not having Parrish, Bird, and McHale, would have exposed.

when the Lakers had Magic, Kareem, and Wilkes, they masked the weaknesses that would have been exposed if all 3 where injured at the same time.

when IU and Knight had Benson, May, and Buckner, in 76, it masked weaknesses that would have been exposed absent having them.

when Ginger and Mary Ann were both on Gilligan's Island, it masked the weaknesses the island would have had without them.

When you matched those top 3 groups, with a championship culture, built on the things our program is obviously lacking...they kicked the shit out of everyone.

When the assholes northwest of us lost a lottery pick, a big they heavily relied on, and a couple key guards...they replaced them with a couple unathletic freshmen guards, and with the things our program is lacking, are kicking the shit out of everyone.

 

[i'vegotwinners]

When you matched those top 3 groups, with a championship culture, built on the things our program is obviously lacking...they kicked the shit out of everyone.

When the assholes northwest of us lost a lottery pick, a big they heavily relied on, and a couple key guards...they replaced them with a couple unathletic freshmen guards, and with the things our program is lacking, are kicking the shit out of everyone.

those top three groups are what comprised the culture, and provided what would have been lacking from the program without them.

DUH!

you don't lose 2 key starters and have a 3rd playing at less than 100%, without taking a big hit.

something i would like to see in the future, is some wings and guards who could literally take over a game in HS on the offensive end, and did so on a regular basis. (even if they aren't elite size).

hard to take over a game in college, when that wasn't your regular role in HS.

people don't see court sense/instincts and ball handling and shooting touch as "athleticism", but they absolutely are.

in the mean time, Bates and Leal both need to become much better ball handlers to be the players they could be, TJD to expand his range out to 5 feet from 1 foot, and Geronimo to trust his instincts while playing as a man possesed.

JHS and Galloway to continue to improve their outside game, which has improved noticeably already for both.

TJD even having a 5 ft face up game, makes him a totally better player and adds options bringing it home.

 

[go_iu]

The only hope we have is to run the offense through JHS, TJD needs to be a decoy and pass better, or this is last year again

 

[IUNorth]

those top three groups are what comprised the culture, and provided what would have been lacking from the program without them.

DUH!

you don't lose 2 key starters and have a 3rd playing at less than 100%, without taking a big hit.

something i would like to see in the future, is some wings and guards who could literally take over a game in HS on the offensive end, and did so on a regular basis. (even if they aren't elite size).

hard to take over a game in college, when that wasn't your regular role in HS.

people don't see court sense/instincts and ball handling and shooting touch as "athleticism", but they absolutely are.

in the mean time, Bates and Leal both need to become much better ball handlers to be the players they could be, TJD to expand his range out to 5 feet from 1 foot, and Geronimo to trust his instincts while playing as a man possesed.

JHS and Galloway to continue to improve their outside game, which has improved noticeably already for both.

TJD even having a 5 ft face up game, makes him a totally better player and adds options bringing it home.

There's "taking a hit"...and there's getting a Mike Tyson uppercut. Right now, it looks like we've been knocked the F out. That wouldn't happen with the talent we still have available, if there were solid foundational principles all IU players were being effectively taught.

All 3 of those programs were already good, and were built on tangible, reliable, repeatable things...before the core guys you mentioned showed up. They just took something solid, and made it great. IU had been to a Final four a year or two before May and company showed up, as an example. Its also why IU was basically always good under RMK. Then when he had a special group of experience and talent, he usually did a lot of damage, including hanging some banners.

Having said all this...play a good, competitive game tonight, with a great chance to win late...and that's a great sign of life. Winning at PSU wasn't going to be easy fully healthy, and clicking on all cylinders. So if we do win, or even play them tough until the end...that's a decent sign that Woody and the guys might still get it figured out.

 

[i'vegotwinners]

There's "taking a hit"...and there's getting a Mike Tyson uppercut. Right now, it looks like we've been knocked the F out. That wouldn't happen with the talent we still have available, if there were solid foundational principles all IU players were being effectively taught.

All 3 of those programs were already good, and were built on tangible, reliable, repeatable things...before the core guys you mentioned showed up. They just took something solid, and made it great. IU had been to a Final four a year or two before May and company showed up, as an example. Its also why IU was basically always good under RMK. Then when he had a special group of experience and talent, he usually did a lot of damage, including hanging some banners.

Having said all this...play a good, competitive game tonight, with a great chance to win late...and that's a great sign of life. Winning at PSU wasn't going to be easy fully healthy, and clicking on all cylinders. So if we do win, or even play them tough until the end...that's a decent sign that Woody and the guys might still get it figured out.

Downing and Ritter were the core of the final 4 team a couple yrs before, and both were already gone when May played his first game for IU.

then when May went down on the deepest team in IU history, they lost to a team they could have beaten by 40 earlier in the yr had they not let up on the gas.

had they lost 2 starters and had a 3rd at less than 100% rather than just having May wearing a cast, the impact would have been greater than just having a hobbled May.

go troll elsewhere.

 

[IUNorth]

Downing and Ritter were the core of the final 4 team a couple yrs before, and both were already gone when May played his first game for IU.

then when May went down on the deepest team in IU history, they lost to a team they could have beaten by 40 earlier in the yr had they not let up on the gas.

had they lost 2 starters and had a 3rd at less than 100% rather than just having May wearing a cast, the impact would have been greater than just having a hobbled May.

go troll elsewhere.

But they still would have been good. We fell from a team pushing top 10 capabilities to a non NCAA team.

 

[i'vegotwinners]

But they still would have been good. We fell from a team pushing top 10 capabilities to a non NCAA team.

losing 2 integral starters and having a 3rd at less than 100% can absolutely do that.

especially when the scoring of said 3rd at less than 100%, is dependent on being 100%.

sounds like trolling to me.