FOR INDIANA FANS:
I wanted to include this quick right up in my thread for all the Hoosier fans out there. Sure critics have the right to say what they want as well, but the fan that I am (though I feel a very logic one as my play against them last week should have showed) I am still optimistic. Thats pretty much how I approach everything in my life so here you go:
Here is trying to keep things in perspective.
Now at the same time, when it gets as bad as it did Tuesday night against Wake Forest, there?s only so much you can say without going off on one negative rant after another. Patrick Ewing Jr. looked good at times but he still has a ways to go. Beyond that, there wasn?t a lot of good to point out.
But the point is simply this. It?s December 3rd. The season is four games old. Tuesday night, IU started with a lineup of two freshmen and three sophomores against the 18th ranked team in the nation, playing on a court where they have won 19 straight games. This was a team that won the ACC last year and was a No. 2 seed in the tournament. IU was an 11-point underdog going in, and they probably were going to lose in double digits. And that was with George Leach on the floor. Without his 6-foot-11 shot-blocking body out there, things got considerably easier for Wake Forest. Now, no one was expecting the complete collapse that happened, and I?m not about to defend anything that IU did because I don?t think there?s a defense for no defense. And that?s what it comes down to ? IU has to be tougher on the defensive side of the ball.
Finally, as for the Mike Davis bashing, that?s simply something that is going to happen. Heck, people forget about how much Bob Knight bashing there was the last five years. Sure, he had his loyalists but there were a lot of people second-guessing arguably the greatest coach in the game, too, when IU struggled to get past the first round of the NCAA tournament so many years. And people were bashing him in December and January, too. It just seems that with Davis it all gets turned up a notch, and it?s mostly because they question his coaching philosophies when there?s so many people standing around. The thing that troubles me is that people forget that Mike Davis took IU basketball to the national championship game in 2002. And don?t give me the TIRED EXCUSE that he did it with Bob Knight's players. HE DID IT WITH PLAYERS PLAYING HIS SYSTEM. Could Knight have accomplished the same thing? Not everyone thinks so. And I?m talking about guys like Dane Fife, Jarrad Odle, Tom Coverdale and Jared Jeffries who all said that they weren?t sure if IU could have gotten to that game with Knight as the coach. And they should know better then any of us.....so I?ll defer to them on that one.
Right now, I?d worry more about what IU is doing on the defensive end myself. That was the most disappointing part of the Wake Forest game from my perspective as it was very evident that IU couldn?t stop anyone. Inside or out, it didn?t matter. The Demon Deacons were coming down every trip and knocking down a shot in IU?s face, and that?s what to me is most troubling. I think the shots will start to fall as a few young players get more confidence, but defensively IU needs to find a way to slow the landslide here.
In NO way do I believe this Hoosier team will put up stout competition for a final four or anything close to it, but the Hoosiers are young and have a good coach who does make adjustments (remember the Duke game in the tourney on their march to the final four, remember the upset of then #1 Mich St in Assembly Hall; those games were won because of adjustments made by coach davis). They will continue to play a very tough schedule (non conference and conference with a lot of tough games on the road) in preparation to hopefully get a tournament bid and surprise a team or two....if not then build on experience gained in the NIT and come back next year with a more solid foundation and some great recruits.....
BUT THE OPTIMIST THAT I AM, I AM NOT WRITING THIS SEASON OFF IN DECEMBER BEFORE THEIR 5th GAME!!!
Hope you all break your books,
GL
YAZ
