Last night the Hoosiers were able to put on the cruise
control and beat the Texas Southern Tigers by 19 with a final score of
83-64. But that’s not what most of the
headlines this morning were talking about, or at least not what they were leading
with.
No, the real story from last night was the return of former
Hoosier coach Mike Davis, the first person to ever coach an opposing team at
the Assembly Hall after leaving. The
sparse crowd at tip-off gave Davis the welcome back that he deserved: a
standing ovation.
The Hoosiers would go on to win what was a lackluster game,
never really having to work hard to win and never really putting the game
away entirely. While some of the
sloppiness from the previous game went away, Indiana just never really looked
fully engaged, which unfortunately can happen sometimes with lower-tier
opponents.
The Good:
The freshman starting duo. Robert Johnson did a little bit of everything,
putting the team on his back in the first half.
His final stat line read 21 points (leading all scorers), 3-4 from
three-point land, five rebounds, six assists, a steal, and only one turnover in
36 minutes. And just when he began to
fade a bit in the second half, up stepped James Blackmon Jr. After being almost invisible in the first half
(he only had two points), he started up right where Johnson left off, ending
the game with 19 points (also 3-4 from deep), five rebounds, and also only one
turnover. I would argue that even with
the return of veterans Troy Williams and Stan Robinson both Blackmon and
Johnson should retain their starting roles based on how they’ve played so far
this season.
Turnovers (ish). Indiana ended the game with 13 turnovers, many
of them being of the dumb unforced variety.
But it’s also the second game of the season for a young team. Dumb unforced turnovers are going to
happen. An honest assessment of this
team leads me to think that a turnover total under 15 is going to leave this
team in a good place (unless they stop hitting their shots AND don’t rebound
well all at the same time). A more
detailed look at this stat shows that no freshman had more than one turnover,
with Johnson and Blackmon combining for two in a total of 69 minutes on the
court. This is a very encouraging sign
that the freshmen who are handling the ball are doing it well.
Assists and blocks. The Hoosiers racked up 17 assists on the night
(with 32 made field goals). This alone
is good. But 13 of those assists came
from Johnson (six) and junior point guard Yogi Ferrell (seven). This is great for the two primary ball
handlers on this team and if they can both keep this up against stiffer
competition, the Hoosiers could surprise a few teams. The blocks by some Indiana players were also
impressive. Junior forward Hanner
Mosquera-Perea swatted away five shots (a career high for him) while the 6’7”
sophomore forward Collin Hartman had three blocks of his own. Both saved some plays for their teammates
with these blocks, and it’s a good sign of things to come if it continues.
The play of Collin Hartman and Nick Zeisloft. They both played their roles very well, even
if it was a little quietly. Zeisloft,
who at times has seemed to force things (including shots, drives, and passes)
on the court, took what was there. He
hit both of the shots he took (both being threes), grabbed six rebounds (the
highest on the team), had an assist, two steals, and only one turnover. This is the Nick Zeisloft who needs to show
up every game, even if he does lose his starting spot to the returning Troy
Williams.
Hartman was similar, continuing his first-man-off-the-bench
role. He finished with three points,
four rebounds, three blocks, two steals, an assist, and a single turnover, all
in 17 total minutes. He’s looking
particularly active on defense, with one sequence sticking out to me in
particular. Freshman Max Hoetzel stole
the ball under the opponent basket before promptly throwing it right back to a
waiting Tiger. The said Tiger was a
little too eager on the shot, but it was rebounded by another Tiger, as all the
Hoosiers had already taken off down the court, save Hartman. He came up and swatted the put-back attempt
out-of-bounds, giving the rest of the team a chance to get back to defense and
saving Hoetzel from giving up those points.
These are the types of smart plays Hartman has been making since his
return from tearing his ACL in March, and it is these same smart plays which
are making the argument for his continued playing time as players return.
The Not-so-good:
Rebounding. The
Hoosiers were once again outrebounded by an inferior, and shorter, team. The average height of TSU is 6’4”, but they were
without 6’7” starting senior forward Jose Rodriquez. IU has an average height of 6’6” both with
and without the three Hoosiers who will be rejoining the team Thursday. So both teams are a bit undersized, and
Indiana should have been able to grab rebounds in bunches. But they didn’t. While Mosquera-Perea had a decent overall
game, he is continuing to struggle with the concept of boxing out in order to
better get both hands on the ball on rebounds.
In comparison, three of his four fellow starters (all guards) had as
many or more rebounds, and the final starter, Ferrell, only had one fewer. That’s not good. The Tigers were able to rebound about a third
of their misses, whereas the Hoosiers rebounded on under 30% of their
misses. This needs to change before
Indiana starts playing better, taller teams.
However, if they can keep shooting the way they are and keep the
turnover total under about 15, the rebounds won’t always kill them.
Turnovers from upperclassmen. Eight out of the team’s 13 turnovers came from
the starting duo of Ferrell (five) and Mosqurea-Perea (three). This is way too many from the veterans. Some dumb freshman mistakes at this stage in
the game are expected, and one or two per game from the veterans is
understandable. But Ferrell in
particular should not be turning the ball over this much, even if he did have
seven assists to balance it out. One of these turnovers, right at the end of
the first half, saw Ferrell step on the baseline just after Coach Crean took a
timeout to draw up a final play of the half (practicing for games where it
would matter). Luckily for the Hoosiers,
the Tigers weren’t good at capitalizing on the turnovers, only scoring two
points off of the eight veteran miscues.
Free throws (are called free for a reason). But the Hoosiers don’t seem to be treating
them that way, only hitting nine of 16 attempts for 56%. I mean, maybe some of these guys should start
taking their free throws from behind the three-point arc, seeing as the
three-point percentage was higher than the free throw percentage as a team. This is one of those things which is fixed
through repetition, so hopefully some of these guys are hitting Cook Hall to
put up some free throws before the game Thursday. I would also like to see the team get to the
line a few more times per game, but this should also increase some with
Williams and Robinson back in the lineup, both of whom were very good at
drawing fouls last year.
The Final Word:
Lackluster. That is a
good final word for this game. The
Hoosiers had trouble again with the starts of each half, and never really put
the Tigers out of their misery. This isn’t
too harmful in these cupcake games, but won’t help any in the Big Ten
schedule. The Hoosiers need to rebound
much better than they already are, and really just need to play more physically
overall. Some of this will be helped
with the players returning on Thursday.
Up Next:
Thursday, Nov. 20, the Indiana hosts the Mustangs of
Southern Methodist University. This is
decidedly not a cupcake game (even with the Mustangs missing a few key cogs from their lineup), so this game will feature a preview post all its
own. Be on the lookout for that tomorrow or Thursday afternoon.
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