You're listening to the Back Home Network presented by Home Field Apparel. Welcome back to Crimson Cast. Galen Claudia joining you? Solo tonight, Friday, March 1st. Happy March. We sleep in May. Whatever the the phraseology goes, we are in what is normally the happiest. Time of the year. For basketball and. Looking forward to following along. Unfortunately, from afar it feels like at. Least on men's basketball, Side of things, women's basketball still.
Very much in the thick of potentially getting to host. A first and 2nd. Round set of games at Assembly Hall. Anyway, lots going on across the. Country in basketball. Throughout the course of this month, this will be a relatively short podcast. Got a couple? Things I wanted to touch on before we got to the weekend, so. Hopefully we'll have some things of interest to you here as we talk through. Everything today before we get into the main.
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We'll look forward to seeing you there. Anyway, let's talk. About a few items going on in IU Sports land and it's going to break. Things down first of all. I wanted to touch on women's basketball real quick, of course. A big win for them last. Week last Thursday, obviously. That huge win against. Iowa, They follow that up with a. Big win on the road. On. Tuesday night as they. Blew out. Northwestern.
It's kind of a track. Meet for a while, but it was, you know, great to. See the women getting out there and playing with such offensive freedom, Sydney Parish was back in the starting lineup. Look really good and they'll be playing again. This is really annoying for all of us who are trying to follow both. The men's and the women's team simultaneously. Tuesday's game was. Right up. Against the Indiana, Wisconsin game, and they both played
exactly the same time. The women's game got over a little bit earlier, and then on Sunday, same things going to happen. Indiana has. Their season closer at? Home and Indiana men are on the road at Maryland, so I'm going to have to bust. Out the dual TV. Set up once again, but I will. Gladly do it. Because obviously, the women have been a tremendous amount of fun to watch. Looking forward to seeing them close out. The season in a strong. Way Big 10 titles.
Got to reach, unfortunately at this point, but still playing. For seeding and really looking like an interesting Big 10 tournament, that's going to be taking place up in Minneapolis. As. We are going to see. Probably if if the. Seating. Holds, we're go most. Certainly going to see Indiana and Iowa if they win their first game matching up in the semi finals. They're both 14 and 3. Ohio State will win the league. They're 16 and one and it's just going. To be a really interesting thing
to watch. As as Indiana and Iowa, who have had very similar seasons. Iowa. Ranked a bit higher, their 6th in the. Country Indiana's 14th, but Indiana with a chance if they can. Pull off the. Season, not the sweep, but obviously, but win the two out of three by winning that third game on a neutral. Court against Iowa. That would go a long way towards securing that home first and second round match up, so keep
an eye out for that. And again, we're going to see the women in action one more time. You might if you're in the Bloomington area, consider going to that game. I'd highly recommend it. They're trying to pack the arena as Indiana takes on Maryland to close out their season, a team that they beat by 14 points earlier on this season. As far as the men?
Are concerned obviously. A really good win for this Indiana team earlier on in the week as they knocked off Wisconsin. A bit of a surprise, I think. To a lot of people. As Wisconsin has been a real. Problem for Indiana? For the last 20 some years, Indiana had not been. Playing very well, they lost four in a row and. Five of six coming into that game. They had lost pretty handily at Wisconsin. There were some promising signs in that Wisconsin game. I think for Indiana, I'm not.
Sure, how replicable the. The positive things that. We saw were, but you know when you look at the. Way that the game went, I mean first of all. Khalil Ware. With just another tremendous performance, I mean. 27 points 11. Rebounds 4 for, four from. The free throw. Line, which for Indiana's a big. Deal five blocks. Only one turnover played 38. Minutes. I mean he. Was really the reason why Indiana won the game? And yes. There were some good plays. Down the stretch, Trey.
Galloway with 12 assists. You know you got. You know, pretty good shots at various. Points from Mackenzie Imbacco. He had a couple. Of big threes throughout. The course of the game he don't hit. Free throws. And Xavier Johnson? Even though he didn't have a great offensive game and did have the five turnovers, it was nice to see him back in uniform. Honestly wasn't expecting that. Malik, Renew, obviously. He had kind of a good game and a
bad game. 14 points, 8 rebounds. That was crucial but but certainly still struggling with foul issues. And had a got a weird sequence at the. End of that game anyway, I bring all. That up, because it was. Really nice to see. Indiana rally a bit and and pick themselves. Up off the carpet, especially after the way they had lost those previous four. Games, you know, blown out. At Purdue, losing that Northwestern. Game. Where they it really, it always felt like. Northwestern was in control.
After the the first few minutes, the Nebraska game which was? Just a disaster. And then the Penn State game on the road. Which? Was a pretty. Even game except for that. One stretch where? Indiana. Gave up eleven. Points in a row. So at least you know there's a. Pulse with this Indiana team, and that's good. They're going to need that. Because obviously at this. Point the NCAA tournament's kind of out the window. You're 15 and three. You're 7:00 and 10:00. But.
Right now. It's like you got to play for pride, you've got to play to try to set yourself up for not having to. Play on Wednesday in the Big 10. Tournament avoiding. The. The. 11:14 and 12:00. 13 games that. You have to play if you're, you know the those. Wednesday games if you're. At the. Bottom of the standings and. It's a it's a dogfight, right? Now I mean there. Are basically. You know Michigan's going to be in the 14 see like they are. Michigan is adrift, but you've got Penn.
State at 8:00 and 10:00 right now. Rutgers at 7 and 10, Indiana at 7:00 and. 10 but behind Rutgers. Because of the tiebreaker. Maryland at 7:00 and 11:00 Indiana has the. Tiebreaker on them, but they could lose that if they lose the game. To Maryland and they fall 1/2 game back and then Ohio. State Who's surging right? Now and Ohio State gets to host Michigan this weekend, so they're probably going to go to 8:00 and 11:00, so. This is a really.
Critical game for Indiana coming into this Maryland game this weekend and I. I don't know how they're going to play. I mean, Maryland is is really bad. Offensively, like, as much as people have complained about Indiana's offensive problems, Maryland. Is they're not Rutgers. Bad, because that is a special category of hellish offensive. Performance, but Maryland's pretty. Bad 160. Second, in the country and within the conference. They're 13th out of 14.
Teams barely behind Michigan, but defensively, Maryland is. Very, very, very good. They're one of the top teams in the country, believe. It or not in defensive efficiency, and it's got to. Absolutely burn their fans up that they're wasting an incredible defensive year. With how badly they have played offensively over the course of the. Season. You know, it's interesting because if you go back and look at that game Indiana played against Maryland, it wasn't like
Indiana played. I'm talking about the one back in at the. Beginning of December, Indiana. Didn't. Play offensively that well. In that game, they were under. A point per. Possession at home they only. Shot 48%. From two, they didn't take very many threes. They hit three out of nine in that game. But Maryland was God awful offensively. They. They were at point. Eight points per possession. And. Two for 16 from three, they just.
They really. Could not make things happen and and you know the the key in that game for Indiana was how good Indiana was on the offensive glass. Trey, Galloway and Mackenzie and. Bacco both had three offensive rebounds. Ware, Banks and Sparks all had two offensive rebounds. They were two. Team offensive rebounds, Indiana. Grabbed 43% of offensive boards. It was a It was. Maybe Indiana's? Best offensive rebounding. Performance of the season I I At least in the Big 10, it feels that way.
But Maryland's gotten. Better you know that. This is the thing that I think is concerning and we've talked about it a. Little bit on the podcast before it's like. Maryland has been closer than Indiana in most of the games. That they've played here over the Really. Since really? Since the the beginning of of 2024. They they they got blown out by Purdue at home. But then they. Lost by three to. Minnesota. They beat Michigan by 7. They beat Illinois by 9. On the road, that's still.
Probably the most inexplicable. Outcome that we've seen in the Big 10. So far this year, 3 point loss to Northwestern 2 point. Loss to Michigan State Two point win against. Iowa Huge blowout. Win at home against. Nebraska And so on and so. Forth, I mean, they've had very few games where they were just out of it, and they've had a couple of games where. Things have just clicked. For them.
So in this game, I guess what concerns me is that if if Maryland can put together some kind of an offensive. Performance, where they're at least scoring like a point per. Possession I do. Worry about Indiana's ability to match them. Offensively, if they're going to. Let Maryland score. And I think Maryland's going to make it hard on Indiana to score. And I do wonder to some degree with this Indiana team. Like what is their mentality?
They come off a big win. For them, relatively speaking. I mean, obviously beating Wisconsin. Wisconsin is not. Where they were earlier in the year, but. It's still a nice. Way to kind of right the ship. So then what? You know, how does Indiana put themselves in a position? Where they're like, OK, now you're going on the road and you're playing a team that you've beaten already, which that's. Difficult and you beat.
Them pretty handily. We we've seen this time and time again, not just with Indiana but with other teams. It's hard to get. Up for a team that you've already handled. For the most part earlier. On in the season. And you just kind of factor in like Indiana's defense? Was was pretty good. Against that, in that Wisconsin game. I mean, it wasn't. Exemplary, they allowed 1.11. Points per possession. But Indiana scored better. And so ultimately for Indiana. They need to take the same.
Number of threes or more that. They took in that. Wisconsin game as a. Minimum. They took fourteen in that game. Indiana has not. Shot well on the. Rd. You know, can they put themselves in a position where they're scoring enough points that Maryland just can't keep up? Because that's essentially been Maryland's MO for most of the season. I'm really curious to see what the team's mentality looks like and how they handle this, because I am.
I'm. I'm still unconvinced that this Indiana team is. Like, really got it. Figured out and and yet I want to see them continue. To build back towards. A team that is dangerous to play on a nightly basis, which they kind of lost. There for large sections of February, so we'll. See what happens and. I think, I say. That every time I'm previewing a game, and it's true, we will. See what? Happens. I have no clue, no, no vibe off of this game. I'm I'm not even sure who they'll favor.
I'm. Assuming that Maryland will. Be a pretty. Decent favorite. Just because that's what the advanced statistics are saying right now, you know. But this is where it's interesting. Because if you look at. Ken. Palm. It's projecting Maryland. As an 8 point favorite in this game, which that's pretty. Wild. Considering Indiana's already beaten Maryland. By 12 at home. That's a huge swing, but it's indicative of how bad Indiana has played.
And how Maryland has been closer than I think people realize. To being a functional team and. You know all you have. To do is just kind of. This is where the. Advanced statistics. Will tell a tale. Sometimes that the record does not. You know, despite both. Indiana and Maryland having essentially the same record, 15 and 13 for Indiana, 15 and 14 for Maryland. Maryland is 48th in adjusted efficiency. So they're that means they're 48th in Kenpalm and Indiana is 101st.
And you know if you look at Maryland from a. Statistical perspective. We've talked about this a little bit. The luck. Statistic If you follow Ken Palm a lot, a lot of people don't. Understand what that means. The luck statistic basically says. Given the statistical profile. Of how you have played so far, your record is either above or below that based upon what we would. Expect it to be from your performance in Indiana's case. They are considered one of the luckiest.
Teams in college. Basketball. They're. 18th in the country in the luck statistic, which means that the statistics say Indiana's record should actually be. Worse than it is. And and yet Indiana's won some extra games. Maryland's the exact opposite. Maryland's luck statistic is 300 and. 60th in college basketball, which is. I mean, there's only 360. Two teams in college basketball. This year that gives. You an idea of. How well Maryland has played despite.
Not having the wins to show for it, that should be concerning and that's why it's an 8 point gap on Ken Palm, so Indiana. You know they need to try to bottle whatever emotion. They had and whatever focus they had in that Wisconsin game try to apply it to this one and. You know, play better defense. You know that. Still keeps coming back to me as the primary thing, the effort on. Defense against. Wisconsin was better than it had been for the previous four games.
They've got to figure out a way to make it even better than that if they're going to have a chance against Maryland on Sunday, so hopefully they'll be able to do that. I wanted to bring up something else, so I'm going to transition to. A kind of a broader scale. Topic It's March 1st of 2024. This is, you know, it feels like deja vu for IU fans because after a couple of years of at least being in. The tournament picture IU now finds itself. Back out of the.
Tournament picture decisively this time, you know. In the Archie Miller era, yeah, obviously the COVID year. Indiana was kind of in the mix and was probably going to make the NCAA tournament. And then the tournament got. Cancelled the previous year. That that 2019 year Indiana was in the mix. They were. They were borderline, but they were clearly close. They were one of the first four teams out of the tournament because. They were a one seed in the NIT and. And then in the.
Previous. Year they They really weren't in the mix. But they were. Kind of. They were on. At least the the peripheral bubble to you know to kind of early as you. You know you got into the middle. Part of February. That team was nine and seven in the conference, 16 and 12. They were on a four-game winning streak and you thought, well, gosh, if they win their last two games against. Nebraska and Ohio State. You know, they'd be 18 and 12:00 and 11:00 and 7:00. They might make it and that
didn't happen. And my. Point in all that? Is this is another March where IU as a program and IU fans are on the sideline and it's. It stinks. It's, it's. Really hard. And it's sad, you know, I think if you're an IU fan or if you're someone that that cares about the program. To watch this. Being the you know. Again, kind of where? Indiana's AT and. Obviously there's a twist. This time around, which? Is that there's a. Tremendous amount of. For those of you who are not.
Terminally online, like some of us, there's a. Lot of conversation going on right now, obviously about the program about you know what's what's the disposition of Mike Woodson, you know there's been a lot. Of those. Types of conversations being had and. You know, I advise everybody to go. Listen to the state of the. Program. Podcast that assembly. Call Did. The last two podcasts that we did. The one that Scott and I did and then the one that we had Tony Adrania on, we hit a lot of
those topics. We we're not going to go over that again. I just. I guess to me, I think it's it's it's important to communicate. How sad. All of this feels because it just, you know, IU. Fans and. IU as a program overall it just every. Time there feels like there's some kind of momentum. It's like something drops out of the sky to just. Stop it in its. Tracks that has gotten so old for so many people and. When I talk with. Fans obviously living in Bloomington, I talk.
With a ton of people about IU basketball. Specifically, and it's at a point now. Where it just feels like people. Are throwing their hands up and they're like I. I don't know why. I'm bothering to care and it's not to. The point where people. Don't care because if they. Didn't care, they just. Wouldn't bring it up. People bringing up IU basketball. And talking about the issues, it's like. They clearly still care if you go out of your way to say.
How much you don't care about something, you still care about something. And and I don't think people are even there quite to that point. Yet. But I think there's just a level of exasperation that after a couple of years of what looked like positive. Progress. It's been this tremendous regression and this, you know, increasingly kind of feels like the norm. Not the exception. When it comes to IU, because it's been that way since essential. Really. For the last. Decade, I mean.
You know, you think about the way if you're. Old enough to remember. How you felt coming off that 2013 season and then that 2014 fourteen season dropping out of the sky in Indiana, missing the tournament. You know, that felt like a. Speed. Bump, but you know. Momentarily, you thought. OK. Maybe things will be fine. And then the next year wasn't very good and then the year after that obviously was was. Surprising and very good. But then the next. Year after that.
The wheels fall off, then you're into a. Coaching change? Then it's you like you're waiting for things to. Get going. And then they never get going under Miller. So I look at this and it's like another instance of people trying to get excited about the program. People getting fully invested. You know, people. Traveling to go watch the team and not only. Are they not? Seeing IU.
Perform the way that. You you know that any fan would hope that their team would perform, but now you've watched another kind of deevolution of the. Program over the course of. You know, mid January. To the end of. February, and now you're out of the tournament. Picture again and. It's not a good. Spot. You know, I mean, you've got, obviously there's been a lot of chatter about recruiting situations. There's been a lot of chat. I mean there.
We've talked on this podcast about the lack. Of clear targets or clear recruiting? You know developments for Indiana. They're going into an offseason with with a single. Player currently committed. They're going to have to hit the portal. Very heavy. And there's some contradictions in going that direction. When you think about the things that have been said during the course of this season about why this season isn't going well.
It's just a very. Daunting thing if you're really paying attention as an IU fan and it's not putting anybody in a. Good mindset it's not. Really putting anybody in a good light, you know and and. It's now we're back. To once again people getting mad at each other. For one thing, or. Another. Whether that is? Fans blaming other fans. For not being. Supportive enough or for on the flip side? Not caring enough. About the trajectory of the program. To to be concerned about things
you've got. You know all these reports that are coming in, and a lot of them are anonymously sourced, so it's hard to say how true or how false they are about infighting. Within the IU basketball family, not the, not the people like obviously on the coaching staff, but like in the broader alumni base, I mean it's. Just. Over and over again it. Just kind of feels like IU basketball is Is this ever revolving soap opera? I'm not. I don't think I'm breaking news to. Anybody in this?
In this audience about it and I don't think anybody knows what's going to actually happen. I and I think. It's still a very. Good chance that nothing you know. Unusual or untoward happens. That. That, Yeah, you just go into the offseason. With the status quo and try to rebuild as. Best you can based upon what's out. There in the portal. That's a bit. Daunting given how? Difficult It's been for. Teams with a lot of. Portal players to to put that group together and have them.
Play coherently. I think for a lot of IU. Fans, It's like, what? Can we just get the season over at this point? Can we just stop? Talking about it and thinking about it and can. We instead just kind of move on to to football for it, which is of all things. It's wild. I love it. Obviously, I mean we've. We've supported football here on Crimson. Cast for a long. Time and talked. About it, but the the number of people for whom the basketball season has almost. Become a burden.
Down the stretch as opposed to. From an emotional perspective. As opposed to being. Something that you're interested in and celebrating is. It's it's the worst. Kind. Of repeat. Performance and it's. The worst kind of deja vu for IU. Fans and you know I I keep coming back to. This this core idea, which is. At some point, it would be nice to just have a program that is consistently good enough that people can feel good about it. And it just feels like it's been forever for IU.
To get to that. Point There's no larger point to this particular part of the podcast. Other than a lament. That this. Is where Indiana finds. Itself yet again and I think. Maybe on top of that? The biggest lament in all of it. From my perspective, is the lack of clarity about what? Might make it better. If you're the type of. Person who thinks that. Indiana needs to make a change. There's no guarantee as we've. Seen now multiple times that a change is going to make everything better.
And there's a chance. That a change could make things worse. On the flip side, if you're the type of. Person. Who thinks that no change should be? Made and and that any talk like. That is very premature. As we talked about on the previous podcast, it's hard to figure out OK, what take take where things are. Currently at not right. Now like logistically what is the route forward that? Allows things to get better and I think that's that's a different kind of spot from
where IU fans have been in the. Past. You know, it felt like. By the end of Queen's time. Most people felt very definitively like, yeah. It's, it's. Time to move on. Like the the the fire's gone out. So to speak, the honeymoon. Period's over to. Borrow a phrase from Ex's and Joes. You know, with Archie, it absolutely felt that way. And I don't know that everybody. I don't know. I'm not sure, people. Felt that way, like New Year's. Day of 2021 with Archie but. The way that that.
Season. Devolved down the stretch. You know it It. Became clear very quickly. That this was not going to work and you know that team finished 12 and 15 like. Even though I think. That firing. Was still a surprise to some people. It. Because IA lot of. People, myself included, thought there would be another another year given people. Were ready to move on. This has been so sudden and on it and the the. The bottom. Dropping out of IU. Basketball. Just kind of. Felt like it it.
Came out of nowhere. There were some warning signs earlier this season, but nothing that would have. Indicated that it would. Have gotten this. Far off track. So it is. It is kind of uncharted waters for Indiana because in. In the last few instances it was like, well, there's a clear break point. And here. I don't think there's a clear break point in the. Minds of a. Lot of people or even if there is. There's not any clear consensus about how that goes down or what that might.
Look like or. Or whether that would even be the best thing to begin with. There's just a lot of of stuff. And I. Look, I'm not. There's. There's things that are that are being covered. By a variety of. Different paid media. I'm not going to talk. About those things. Specifically, I think that. You should go. Find those things. Yourself, if you're interested and and you know, really. Kind of soak all of it in. And try to make a judgement if you're if you're interested in it and that.
But if you're not, I can certainly understand that as well, because at. The end of the day, what you're dealing with is a. Situation where there's a. Lot out there. And there's a lot. Of of differing opinions. There's a lot of. Things being that that are being. Played out in in a kind of a quasi. Public, or at least you know public with. Anonymity approach to things. That don't look good for the basketball. Program don't look good. For the university. But are to me a clear.
Indicator that there is. A real. Behind the scenes. Battle going on about what direction everything's going and. It's going to be interesting. To see how it plays out. My at this point my lone. Hope is that like just. Just get the program back on track somehow. Because after two years that we're pretty good. You're back. To a season that. Just does not live up. To anywhere close to.
Even like the average standard that most IU fans and certainly I think IU administration would want the program to be in. And yet the fans are still there. You know, there's the joke about like the. You know, the, the, the. Truly Donovan social media account that has. Become very popular. That has a lot of insider basketball news. Has a. A paid Discord channel. And there was. There was a post. Today on on X. About. The the amount of IU fans that have invaded that.
Space that are just all over the place. Like the number of IU fans that are out there that are. Clearly, like, very heavily. Engaged and you know are are very passionate one way or another about where things are AT is, is is pretty impressive for a program that frankly just hasn't had much success at all over the last 20 years. You know when you take things in totality, it's just it's the, the. The people are still there, I. Guess would be the message that I would take.
Out of that, the people are still there. The fans are are waiting. And this? Season has played out. About as poorly as you you would hope it would for those people because. There have not been a lot. Of actual highlights. There's not been a lot of like terribly impressive games that, you know, you get the ray of Sunshine game like you get against Wisconsin, but that. Follows 4 games that I think really had a lot of people completely turned.
Off about the the trajectory of the program and way things were going, so. We will see what happens. You know I I. I think to some. Degree. A lot of people have gotten dug in at this. Point about what? Their. Attitudes are towards the program and towards, you know, towards the the coaching. Of the. Program and and the the program and roster management and and this is going to be a really interesting thing. How does this season?
End. Do. Do hearts and minds get changed one way or the other on either side of that spectrum, and how does it end up playing out? That is going to be a really interesting thing to watch. But I also don't, I don't anticipate. That many of you are going. To necessarily want to stick. Around for all the. Gory details. So anyway, we will see what happens as we move forward with all of this. I hope you all. Have a wonderful weekend? Be sure to listen to the Crimson. Cast women's.
Basketball show. Amanda. Foster and Kevin Vera with some good. Insights on what we saw earlier this week against Northwestern. And what to expect on Senior Day? As we will see. Mackenzie. Holmes for the last. Time in Assembly Hall and maybe among. Others we'll we'll. We'll see. So anyway, check that podcast out. It's on the Crimson cast feed. I appreciate you all for indulging me a little bit here on a Friday night. And I look forward to speaking
with you all again soon. We will have coverage after the Maryland game and I would also advise everybody to tune into Assembly Call as they break. Things down immediately. After the fact for the folks here at the. Back home network. I'm Galen Clavio. Thanks for joining us. Bring back the Bison. That's all everybody.