Kdug

Mgbako is not even in consideration for the nba this year. He’s either back or transferring.

I never got this argument. Yes Archie got a 4th year, but his 3rd year was his best so you could argue things were trending in a positive direction. His 4th year also was a disaster that became very toxic, so no idea why that’s pointed to like it was a successful example. If anything, it’s an example of what it could look like if things go poorly.

A little behind on this thread, but wanted to reply to this. You kind of get at it at the end, but those teams use the inside part to setup the outside part. Uconn was top 70 in 3 point rate last year and made a lot of those. Purdue is more inside focus, but that’s because Edey is one of the most efficient scorers that’s played in college in awhile - and even they’re 234th in 3 point rate with the 2nd best percentage. Really since the start of Archie IU has been inside in. We throw it inside, and if that doesn’t work we still force inside. That style has become more extreme under Woodson. Archie at least had a few teams that were top 300 in 3 point rate. Woodson’s first year was the highest 3 point rate at 322. I think a big part of the issue is that Woodson’s teams seem to use deep 2s as the “outside” part of the offense, which is just a losing strategy.

Probably the best game we’ve played since Minnesota, or maybe Iowa? Either way, tonight’s win was needed.

What was that foul Malik?

Truthfully, I feel like we’ve been better with him out tonight. More ball movement and more of a focus on Ware.

Ware with 26 points on 11/12 fg, 5 blocks, and 11 rebounds. Sheesh, what a game so far from him

Kel’el Ware happened

I’ve been as frustrated as anyone with this season, but I try to keep my complaints practical. Anyway, we need someone else to step up in the second half. We can’t expect Ware to duplicate that half, even if he does continue to play well.

I don’t think Ware had sat to that point had he? Ware isn’t the type of player who can go 40 minutes, he needs some rest.

Important last few minutes here. Can’t let them get any closer with how well we played for the first 15 minutes.

Key stretch here with Ware getting a breather. Up 15 when he went out, need to make sure we don’t let them back in it.

Ware is completely dominating this game.

XJ checks in. Glad that he’ll be able to finish his career playing instead of hurt.

Good start, we’ll see if we can keep it up.

Yeah, beard’s coaching abilities aren’t the question. But if it weren’t for the legal troubles, he wouldn’t be available. So kind of a catch 22. If we do end up in a coaching search, I’ll be interested to see who the candidates are. Pearl’s age would be the biggest downside, but he feels like as close as a sure thing as you can get compared to other realistic options. I know a lot of people like Dusty because of the IU connection and what he did last year at FAU, but that feels like a risky hire, granted with huge upside if it works. Hiring Pearl feels like what the Woodson hire should have been. Bring in a guy who you’re confident will succeed in the short term, even if they’re not the long term solution due to age. Then the next time around you’d have the prestige, money, fan support, and now recent success to attract a good long term option.

Underwood left the B12 for Illinois and Willard left the Big East for Maryland. On the flip side, a coach rarely willingly leaves the Big Ten for any of those conferences either. Only one I can think of recently is Shrews leaving PSU to ND - which I think had almost all to do with lack of support at PSU and ties to Indiana.

Yeah, I agree with your overall point that we should be way more competitive than this. Just didn’t necessarily agree that we had that many individual players performing at or above their “star ranking”.

A fringe starter as a senior is essentially the definition of a 3 star, and that’s not meant as a knock at Gallo. But he’s tailor made to be a 6th man type who brings energy off the bench and isn’t asked to carry an offense like he’s been asked to do for IU this year. And I don’t think Cupps has looked like a 3 star at all. I’d consider a 3 star talent roughly a top 150 player in their class. Using Torviks PRPG! ranking - which is essentially offensive rating weighted for usage and minutes - he has Cupps ranked as the 445th out of 452 freshmen who have played at least 20% of their team’s minutes. A lot of freshman struggle more than you think they would, so it’s not like he can’t get better next year. But he hasn’t looked like a player who was ready for college level basketball.

I don’t really agree with your assessment at all outside of Ware. Granted, I think a lot of that is guys aren’t being put in positions to succeed. I do agree that we’re playing well below what we should be based on the level of talent on the roster.

Defense has been the bigger issue recently too. Each of the last 4 games our opponent has score more than 1.1 points per possession, which essentially means our offense would need to score 75-80 points just to have a shot to win in a normal tempo game.

What’s wrong with that take? That was the difference in the first half. There is no commentary on what we should or shouldn’t be doing vs a team like PSU.

Source? Or are you just trolling?

Exactly. I like Woodson as a person, but he doesn’t deserve anything in terms of coaching into the future. All of that is earned, and he’s heavily compensated to be the coach. I’ve said it in a different thread or earlier in this thread, but ultimately Dolson needs to do what’s best for the program. You see it in pro sports all the time where a coach gets fired who didn’t “deserve” to (I.e. the Cubs and David Ross), but those teams are doing what they think is in their best interest. With how much money goes into IU basketball, they need to start acting like a big time/pro organization.

Honestly, they should be more optimistic. They’re popular enough that they represent the fan base to a certain degree, and I think they do that reasonably well. I wouldn’t want a popular IU podcast to constantly be pessimistic. Even now I think they do a good job of communicating the disappointment without coming across like they’re just trashing the program.