I'll throw my speculation into the thread. After, my speculation is just as good as everyone else's speculation.
Last night's game against Rutgers made me think (1) whatever is wrong with the offense has something to do with Langford, and (2) our defense isn't horrible, but the helpside players looked out of position and were often not able to either stop dribble-drives down the foul lane or opponents crashing the board from the weakside after missed shots from their teammates (where most missed shots seem to bounce).
When Langford gets the ball on offense, the whole world seems to come to an end. I like his drives to the basket, but last night Rutgers was fairly good at challenging his drives (but he kept trying to drive anyway). I'd like to try an offense where Langford is the point guard at the top of the key looking to feed our best shooters (Phinissee and Durham) on the wings or corners and Morgan and Smith as additional possibilities down low. When Langford has the ball under present circumstances, everybody knows he's going to try to drive down the lane, so the other four guys tend to stand and watch while the defense prepares to counter Langford's inevitable foul lane drive. I'd like to see an offense where the defense has to be aware of where Langford is and pay attention to him but might lose track of the other four. Langford is a good enough passer to do this role.
For me, the defensive play that may say it all was that play where Rutgers rebounded our missed shot and dribbled right past Romeo and scored a layup while he was standing there adjusting his sleeve. Romeo looked to be the only IU player that could have prevented the fast break, but he had a sleeve adjustment emergency that he thought just couldn't wait. And, how many times did we fail to block out a weakside Rutgers player who crashed the boards for a thunder dunk? Letting that happen once is a mistake; failing to block out all those other times is a bad habit.
