IU 58 Wake Forest 83

I really thought I would be able to get in the proper mindset to take this season in stride, but I can't help it, I am still really pissed off right now. Definitely not pissed at how IU played, but I am pissed off that these players, us the fans, and the IU name has to go out there and get embarrassed. It just sucks. I'm pissed off that Wake Forest had their starters in with less than 4 minutes to go with a 27 point lead. IU did a damn fine job to shut down Teague (a freshman out of Indy and one of the best in the country) and hold him to 0 points in the first half. Then, he is still in there when the game is way out of reach and clearly just filling the stat sheet. I'm sorry, but in my world, there is no way in hell that he comes down the lane with 3:52 on the clock in a 27-point game for a high-flying dunk. I'm not looking to hurt anyone, but that's a hard foul waiting to happen in my world. Sorry, I just had to vent. That's just the way I feel and I can't help it that I still get fired up about this. Anyway, on to the game..... You really have to like how this Hoosier team came out and played. The very first road game for these guys and they head into a ranked ACC team's arena. I honestly thought this game would be blow-out city from the outset. I was thinking the game might open with something like 16-2, then be 39-11 at the 10 minute mark and 53-18 at half. That wasn't the case at all. This game was tied at 20-20 right around the 10 minute mark and I think that is incredibly impressive. The scary thing was that in those opening 10 minutes, Dumes had his head 10 feet up his ass with 4 turnovers and IU was 5-10 from the line. Unfortunately, the next 10 minutes were fatal as Wake outscored us 27-11 for a 47-31 halftime lead. Then, as the lead would slowly build in the second half, you could tell a little dejection was setting in for our young Hoosiers which is only natural. But this coaching staff is relentless with keeping the energy up and it showed tonight. This game never got above a 30-point lead, which shocked me especially with the Wake starters playing until 3 minutes to go in the game. To put things in perspective here, we had a walk-on freshman start and play 35 minutes in this game. And then, our first guy off the bench tonight just 2 minutes into the game was a guy from the baseball team who just happened to win a 3-point shooting contest. So, the goal of this year (and especially in games like this) is to try to find the positives. Actually, I think there were a lot of positives out of this game: * As mentioned above, this was the very first road game ever and it was going into a ranked ACC team's arena......were the Hoosiers intimidated? No. Outmatched? Yes. But intimidated? Absolutely not. I touched on it a little bit above, but I think IU actually had Teague rattled in the first half. It wasn't until this game was in blow-out mode and incredibly sloppy that you even heard Teague's name. Also, even after being "posterized" by several monster dunks, the IU players would scrape themselves up off the floor and go play hard at the other end -- no whining to the refs that there should have been a charge, no sulking that their backside will probably be on SportsCenter's top plays, they just kept playing hard. * They proved to themselves that they can hang with a ranked team on the road for 10 minutes. They are nowhere near being able to do it for 40 minutes, they just don't have the talent on the roster to do that. But 10 minutes is a pretty long stretch to play to an even 20-20 tie when you are so severely outmatched. * IU was only outrebounded 34-30 against a team that played 4 players over 6'11" and way, way, way more athletic. There were a couple possessions where IU was crashing the offensive glass and got 3 looks at the basket. * This game prepares them to SHOCK THE WORLD against Gonzaga this weekend at Lucas Oil Field. Just kidding. Unfortunately, we are so young and so overmatched that you can't even make crazy "shock the world" predictions. There is literally a 0.0% chance that we win that game. Let's move on the report card. Overall Team Performance: B It was a lot better than I expected. IU had 26 turnovers, but in all honesty, you have to expect the turnovers on a team that is so young and outmatched so severely in size, strength, and athleticism. I bet you that I use the word "outmatched" over 1,000 times this year on this blog. That's just going to be a fact of life and there isn't a whole helluva lot you can do about that. I think Crean is doing all he can by keeping the energy high, focusing on hustle, and mixing in the zone defense. The good thing on the turnover front was that IU hustled back after a lot of those turnovers and immediately intercepted a pass to get the ball right back. That must have happened close to 10 times. IU was able to force 24 turnovers total. Tom Pritchard: C- Pritchard was just outmatched tonight. Even if he would make a nice move around his defender, there was just another big athletic guy waiting on him. On a normal team, Pritch would have some help from another big guy down low. But when playing a team like Wake and now that other teams know that Pritchard has been our best player, it's going to get really tough on him. He only managed 1-7 from the field, but I still liked some of his moves and his aggressiveness. I think he had two missed dunks, but got fouled on one or maybe both of them. If he continues to improve, he will be tough for some Big Ten teams to handle. Malik Story: C- Story had a really good first half. He opened the game with a trey and did some really good things throughout the first half. But then he absolutely came unglued in the second half with a flurry of turnovers and a couple missed layups. I really like his overall game, but sometimes he gets going too fast. And he sucks on defense. Daniel Moore: B I was actually pretty impressed with Moore's overall performance. With Verdell Jones sitting this one out, Moore was forced into 35 minutes of action. Honestly, I thought we would see a pretty predictable pattern in Moore's play -- I figured he would play good against the likes of IUPUI, Chaminade, and Cornell and then I figured he would look like the ball-boy against the likes of Wake Forest. But he certainly held his own, especially in the first half. Yes, he had some blatant turnovers and yes he got his shot swatted a couple times, but I still thought he definitely made some plays and was able to break down Wake's defense at times. Also, keep in mind that he had the ball in his hands a ton of time in this game. So really, 4 turnovers is not all that bad in my mind. Nick Williams: A- His 3-point shot looked horrible (0-4), but Williams answered my call for him to hit the glass with 10 boards and just missed a double-double with 9 points. This team really needs him to help out on the glass. Also, after being plagued with the turnover bug (like the rest of the team), he only had 1 tonight. Devan Dumes: D Dumes is the guy on this team that drives me crazy. In the opening 10 minutes, he had 4 turnovers and two missed 3s. One of the 3s was a bad shot that was way too deep and the long rebound led to a dunk the other way. I think all 4 turnovers also lead to easy baskets. Again, this was all in the opening 10 minutes when IU played Wake to a 20-20 tie and had a couple leads during that time. If Dumes is playing better, IU actually could have opened a decent lead and made Wake start to sweat a little bit. I should note that Dumes did hit a 3 in that opening 10 minutes, so like I have previously said, there seems to be good, bad, good, bad with Dumes. Unfortunately, tonight was lopsided in the bad direction. I do have to admit that I kind of like the haircut and I think he looks like P Diddy or Puff Daddy or whatever his name his. Dumes finished 7 turnovers, 0 rebounds, and 0 steals in 30 minutes. Matt Roth: A- The box score I am looking at has him at 4-5 from the arc, but I am almost positive that I remember 2 misses. He definitely missed one and made one on a single possession. But I also thought after his first make, he missed one on the very next possession. I have no idea why I am going into this much detail on this.....who the hell cares.....regardless, Roth had a really good shooting night and a couple of steals, so that was good to see. Even though there are some limitations to his game, I like it when Roth is on the floor. I just feel like it gives them a true threat that has to be accounted for on the offensive end, especially from the outside. Dumes has yet to find his shooting touch, Williams and Story look like they will maybe hit the occasional 3, but Roth is a true threat with even a slight opening. I am not a big fan of some of the deep ones that he launches, but he has now hit a couple deep ones and that does provide some additional space for Pritchard to operate. Kipp Schutz: C+ Unbelievable that a guy from the baseball team that won a 3-point shooting contest was the first guy off the bench tonight. But he actually came in the game early and had a steal and a nice assist. But then later in the game, he had a couple turnovers, an ugly 3-point attempt, and 2 very ugly looking FTs. I hate the name Kipp. Tijan Jobe: C+ 2 rebounds in 8 minutes. Pro-rated to 40 minutes, that's 10 boards. I'll take it. And he pulled one of them down with authority. He had 2 turnovers though and clearly is not ready to have the ball in his hands on the offensive end. I am a big Tijan Jobe fan and will go apeshit when he gets his first dunk of the year. And if anyone is thinking about posting a comment that they don't think he will get a dunk this year, I will take that bet right now. The Chief will put it in the basket. Kyle Taber: B+ Taber was very active tonight. He kept a lot of balls alive again, but unfortunately, some of his "tap-backs" were retrieved by the more athletic Wake Forest team and led to some easy baskets. But I definitely like what Taber has to offer with his hustle. He had 3 steals tonight. However, it does make offense a struggle when Taber and Moore are both in the game because neither one is much of a threat. Coming Up: Gonzaga. Ouch. What a tough week. I may just try to get my Christmas shopping done this weekend. Tom Crean will have his work cut out for him to keep these guys holding their heads high and playing with energy. Go Hoosiers!