You're listening to the back home network presented by home field apparel, welcome back to Crimson Cask ale and caviar here, happy Saturday morning or maybe early afternoon depending on when you're listening to this it is the first of October happy October. Those of you people that celebrate that kind of thing, and I guess Happy official, pumpkin spice, latte season, and happy, Big 10 football for real
season. As I you and the rest of the conference, pretty much entirely locked into conference opponents from here on out. Yeah, couple of exceptions here and there, I'm guessing. But overall, this is where stuff actually starts to happen with football, and this is where I use season. Is really going to be made or broken in what happens here. I think over the next four to five weeks. So we're going to talk a little bit about some IU football stuff.
We had some lingering questions from earlier on, in the week that we wanted to tackle and we'll give you a preview of this game. Today is Indiana, takes on the Nebraska Cornhuskers, a really weird game from a matchup perspective, given where these two teams are at right now.
And you know what, sorts of things they're both facing and really I think for both teams how important this game is so we'll talk about that will answer some of the questions that you folks have asked here over the course of the last few days. First of all, just a reminder, that Crimson cast is part of the back home. Network. In the back home network, is brought to you by our presenting sponsor home field apparel,
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there. And really being a home-field apparel purchaser isn't just about the the where it's about the, the rap it's about what they're putting out on social media, they're a great follow, especially during a college football. Right? So be sure to check out home-field apparel, use the code home. Get 15% off of your first order home field apparel.com. Alright, Indiana, football comes into today's game with a three-on-one record on the season disappointing, but not shocking loss.
Last week as they fell on the road to the Cincinnati, Bearcats and, you know, life on the road for IU in general, not really great. Overall there. Not a team that is historically performed well on the road, although it is interesting thinking about that.
If you think about the way that I you is played on the road, historically, there's a lot of reason to kind of duck your head, you know, for instance, from the year 2000 to the year 2009 IU, football won a grand total of four Road games in conference. And two of those happened in the same season 2001, that was that bizarre year where they went on the road and beat Michigan. Dayton Wisconsin.
And then, of course, lost at home to Utah and a couple of other teams, that they shouldn't ended up, missing out on a bowl. But, I will say this, you know, we go back and forth sometimes about Tom Allen, and his overall contributions and, you know, where he's at, in the success levels of IU coaches in the
past. But, you know, I think it's important to keep in mind that this is a guy in Tom Allen who has won eight games on the road in, Conference since he started his head coach and that is just really a tremendous accomplishment. Overall. I mean, Kevin Wilson who coached for about the same amount of time, only managed four wins on the road in conference. And, you know, you've got other coaches out there.
I mean, Bill Lynch one, once on the road in conference Cam, Cameron 13 times, but as I mentioned two of those wins happened in the same year. So you do have to tip your hat to Tom Allen and this IU program over the course. For the last few seasons, they won three games on the road in 2019. They won three games on the road in 2020 and while they didn't win any on the road last year, you know, the obviously it's a new season and, you know, it's going to be fascinating to watch with this IU.
Team is how they handle a situation, where they went out didn't play particularly well in the first half, but then came back. Tom Allen was asked about that in the one of the press conferences during the week. And, you know, he claimed he was going to be changing up practice and they were going to be doing more best offense versus best defense. Sorts of practices to try to get themselves more in the mindset. It's weird.
I mean, this IU team has not started any of their games, particularly, well, this year, I mean, that an OK beginning to Illinois, but I think that was artificially inflated by the fact that Illinois didn't start very well. And that game either, which you would expect in a week, one kind of contest, but, you know, I use Not a good enough team that they can come out and be disengaged or not fully engaged in.
What's going on? They really have to come out and hit things from the beginning especially against a team like Nebraska who, as I mentioned on the podcast, earlier this week with Taylor Layman is they're not good but they're not as bad as people think that they are. This is a Nebraska team that yes you know they've lost three out of their four games. Games and they haven't looked terribly impressive on defense and that's really been their big issue.
But offensively, this is a pretty good team. And, you know, I think Indiana specifically on defense is going to probably have to withstand an early Onslaught from this Nebraska team. They're, they're not, they're not a team with a huge amount of play for at this point. And I think you could take a look at this Nebraska schedule, and you could say, you know, Nebraska's got real problems as they head out of this game and into the rest of the conference
season. Already so far on the season, their own 1 in conference, and that Northwestern loss that they had in Ireland, really looks worse. Every single week. Now, after Northwestern lost two games at home, you know, consecutively to Missouri Valley team in a Mac team. But you this Nebraska team like, they play Indiana at home this week later, they're coming off there by then next week. They travel to Rutgers, that's
somewhat winnable. But is, you know, I mean, In real life on the road in the big tennis tough, they travel to Purdue also somewhat winnable. Then they get Illinois at home, then they got Minnesota at Michigan, Wisconsin, and at Iowa, and so Indiana. I think of that group, I think you'd argue because it's at home is probably the most winnable of
those remaining games. I certainly would hear arguments in favor of at Rutgers, but I also think Rutgers at home is probably going to be a tougher proposition than people think. And I include Anna in that as well as Rutgers is played pretty good defense. So far this season, and they didn't look later look great against Iowa, but it wasn't like, Iowa went in and blew them out or anything like that.
I mean, it's it's so Nebraska, I think comes into this game, trying desperately to get themselves a little bit back on track. You know, they win this game, they're two and three and they, at least have a shot at, you know, getting themselves closer to bowl eligibility. If they were to pick up a few wins on the trot. Not but this game really is the linchpin for this north of this Nebraska team. If they don't win this, the seasons essentially over, they may lose out.
If they lose this game Indiana's in a similar spot. Indiana, if they win this game, they are now only two wins away from Bowl eligibility and it really takes some pressure off of having to win the Michigan game and having to win the Maryland game, you know, simply because those Home games and you really rapidly run out of winnable games once you get past those two, yes, you've got at Rutgers and yes, you've got Purdue at home and certainly. Michigan State hasn't looked
awesome. But I, you know, my concern, with all of those games is, you know, if you line up all of those teams, you know, I think you could certainly say some things - about Rutgers in terms of their overall play, but I don't think they're necessarily on balance that much worse than Nebraska is and my concern is if Indiana can't win at Nebraska, I have a hard time envisioning being than being able to walk into any road environment that they've got moving forward and
be favored. The, you know, they are according to fpi a, they are an underdog against Rutgers just as they are against Nebraska on the road here. So, you know, this, you that's kind of where I'm at with things. Is this idea that when you get down to it, if Indiana can show that You can go into a Nebraska environment that is probably going to be more hostile certainly than what you would find with this IU team, going into say a Rutgers or a Michigan State.
It's still a game that on balance. I think Indiana has to figure out how to win. They've got the offensive Firepower if they can keep blocking to take care of business and their defense certainly has the talent to be able to perhaps timing Nebraska a little bit. From what they would like to do that. The big question of course is going to be, you know, will either of those things actually
be able to suss out? I don't know if that's actually the case because this Indiana team so far has given up 20, 20 to 30 and 45 points in order over the course of the first four games, and Nebraska has scored a lot of points in the games that they played so far this season with the exception of that game against Oklahoma. So a lot on the line for both of these teams and this One of the more winnable games that Indiana's got on their schedule, the rest of the way coming into
the game fpi, gives Nebraska a 60 point seven percent chance of Victory. And, you know, looking at the overall team rankings setup Nebraska right now is essentially estimated to win by a score of about 30, 1227, or 3228, the consensus pick. Just barely right now. According to the numbers is, Aska minus five and a half, five and a half points is a decent amount of money.
The line started lower. I believe the line actually started out at, like two and a half or three, and then moved up pretty quickly to where it's at right now. Indiana Nebraska over under, right now, 61 points. So you know, sounds like Vegas is expecting a pretty high scoring game and I don't blame them because neither of these teams is really shown a tremendous ability to defend the teams playing against. So you know, a lot of things to
think about with this. Name. And a lot of items that I think you could be as we've talked about with this. I you team, there's a lot to be positive about in terms of, if you want to be positive, you can say, well look, Indiana keeps finding ways to win. Indiana keeps themselves in games and then gives themselves a shot in the fourth quarter. And the case of the Cincinnati game, even they, they play well enough, that they can get
themselves back into a game. And they get a couple of bounces that go their way and, and maybe things are different. There's also plenty of room for negative thoughts and feelings. Things about this IU team because you could very easily look at the performance that they had over the first three games and say, yes, they won. But they really didn't play well, the power rankings, you know, the metrics really do not like this Indiana team and the way that they are performing so
far this season. And why would this game necessarily be any different than that? The problem here is, of course, they're on the road and playing a team that you know, while they have certainly underperformed is also I think Certainly purely on numbers a more talented team that me no more talented athletes and just has been coached very poorly over the course of not just this piece this year, but previous years as well.
So, a lot of little things to think about, with all of this, some questions that you all had from earlier on in the week that I wanted to tackle. We wanted to kind of, you know, you know, kind of walk through a few things that we didn't get to on the last podcast. The first one that I wanted to touch on is a question that came in a little while ago, which is basically a question about where Indiana belongs in the hierarchy
of college football. I get this question a lot and I wanted to read it and and, you know, I think there's a clear answer here, but I do think it's important to give some explanation as to why there's a clear order. So a clear answer. So this was from from new East beast on Twitter and his comment was the following Made the
playoffs last year. Averaging less than 40,000 fans and a fraction of I use media Revenue would I you be better off being the best team in a non power five conference instead of perhaps the worst team in the Big Ten East and this is a more common sentiment than one might think. Because I think a lot of people look at the success of a Cincinnati and they say well why can't Indiana do that?
Or they look at the struggles Indiana as had in the Big Ten over the course of Ever. And they say, well, you know why is Indiana even in this conference? Why wouldn't they put themselves in a position where they could win a lot more games by being, you know, like, always drop down to the Mac or let's go to The American or Conference USA. And I think, first of all, from a purely Financial perspective,
that that really makes no sense. Yes, I know that, you know, it's hard to look at Indiana's, bad performance over the course of time and say, gosh this. Worth, you know, all of this money that's coming in but that's essentially an accurate
statement. There is a key element of being a part of the Big Ten. That doesn't necessarily bleed over into productivity or performance which is that you're just in a completely different economic Stratosphere and from a standpoint of specifically, the football program. Yes, Indiana has consistently lost, but dropping down a division, isn't going. To change the reasons.
Why Indiana constantly losses in football or comes up short, or isn't able to compete at the same level as some of these top teams? Ultimately like the reason Cincinnati has been as successful as they've been going to the playoff last year and you know, getting ranked in, you know, they were in the early to mid-2000s when they're in the Big East. You know, they get ranked in the top 10. There are pretty impressive program, overall, Cincinnati has Tired really well.
They've hired excellent, coaches. You know, they, you know, Mark dantonio coach there and Brian Kelly coach there. And obviously, Luke fickle has been a tremendous coach. There Butch Jones before things fell apart, for him at Tennessee, was an excellent coach there. They have done a tremendous job of hiring the right people and building an effective infrastructure around their football program and doing an excellent job of developing talent.
And that you know I mean honestly Hate to say it. But, like, Indiana could do the same thing. There's nothing keeping Indiana from making a transformative higher in football. There's nothing intrinsically wrong with the Indiana that they couldn't do that. Now I, you know, the one issue is there's not really much of a football infrastructure in terms of, you know, a long-standing recruiting Bastian that they just lean on all the time or anything like that but Cincinnati doesn't really have
that. Either. And I really do think that you're Cincinnati's success. Has not been because they're in the AAC because they were successful. When they were in the Big East, their success has come because they've really dedicated themselves to having a top-notch football team. They've made the right hires and they've managed over the course of 20 years. To build up this tremendous amount of momentum that bleeds through on the recruiting Trail. You know, you see players going to Cincinnati.
T because they know that or they feel like at least they're going to get the type of coaching and the type of development to get to the next level. And so you know, it's easy to do, I think look at Cincinnati's spot in the fact that outside of the games against Indiana in order to aim last year, they didn't play anybody. Look at the conference that they're in and assume that the correlation there is, oh, it's because they're in a week or conference and what if Indiana
did that? But I really think it's a cultural thing. It's a dedication thing and it's a Right hires kind of thing. And I mean you look around the league, you know, there have been teams that have been have struggled with success to the level that Indiana has over the course of time who make good hires and then they blow up into something bigger and better. Sometimes it only lasts a few
years. It's like, you know, when Ron Turner was the head coach at Illinois, that was not a program that I think a lot of people looked at before and said, wow, Illinois. That's a, that's a program we want to emulate and yet that team ended up, I think going Into the Sugar Bowl one year, you know, they were a really, really good team. You know, that didn't last very long, but they made the right higher.
They did some good things in recruiting and it ended up working out, Minnesota with PJ Fleck. That was a higher that a lot of people were questioning looks like a pretty good higher now and and looks like that'll continue to pay dividends in the future.
Unless one of the really big boys comes calling and even Purdue, you know, I mean Purdue makes a higher and Joe Tiller that not a lot of people were excited about and he elevates that program for a Gate your time Alan did a mini version of that in the covid year and certainly deserves some credit for it. But you know, there's this is it
has to be a longer-term process. And I think rather than thinking about amusing, about the idea of how it Indiana fair, if they were in a week or Division, I think the bigger thing is, you know, think about, I always look at IU hiring Kevin Wilson and say, okay, that was, you have to look at that as kind of the starting point of Indiana, taking it slow.
Football program. Seriously, not that Wilson was a perfect coach, but Wilson was a different kind of Coach higher than we'd seen Indiana make in the past. And, you know, he brought a different attitude and mentality and unfortunately, for IU, and to some degree for Wilson. I think that project kind of got derailed after four or five years. It didn't really culminate. The way that one might have hoped it would, but it was at least a step in the right direction.
And I think Alan is a continuation of that. But this isn't something that's going to happen overnight. This is something that, you know, you almost have to look at Indiana football. I I've gotten to the point where I kind of look at its history as kind of being divided by The completion of the North End Zone facility because that was really the first time ever in the football program's history.
At least since the late 50s that someone said we need to make some Capital upgrades and Facilities. We really need to start investing in the program. So but you know that the weight room that came with it and you know, the overall budgeting of football, it just was much different in that higher than it had been in the previous four and, you know, while you did have obviously that period of That's with Bill Mallory, in the late 80s, early 90s it.
That was a, that was more of an exception than it was the rule for IU football, in the way that things were. And so I think that, you know, I you as slowly slowly climbing a
mountain. It's possible very much so that they're at a plateau ratan right now because of a variety of factors, but I think those really contribute more than any conference affiliation might plus as I mentioned earlier, just the financial Elements of it would make it basically impossible for a Deanna to not be in the Big Ten. Let's see, Alex G asks, what's the likelihood of the Big Ten expanding to Ten Conference games next year, when USC and
UCLA join? And if so does the conference adopt, a pod based scheduling system. Imagine I you football would desire, Purdue Illinois. Northwestern is its yearly opponents. But obviously, a lot of moving pieces and 16 teams to consider. I really hope that they don't do that. I mean, I think to some degree, You're going to have to have some other considerations beside.
Let's play each other as often as we possibly can with these scheduling setups and I think for Indiana the real consideration that you would hope is that you still get the opportunity to pad your schedule with games against lesser opponents outside the conference. I mean, that is a key element. Overall, in terms of how Indiana is going to continue to get two bowls and I think continuing to
get them to bowl. Is a just, an absolute necessity for this Indiana team to maintain whatever momentum they've got within the recruiting structure that's out there right now. I mean, it's going to get harder, not easier for Indiana to consistently, get to the postseason with the addition of USC and UCLA because, you know, however, much you want to look at California teams and success or failure and you know, whether or not, it's a zero-sum game.
The reality is that's two more brands that are just automatically going. Owing to be viewed as Superior to IU football wise in the Big Ten and you know just pushes I you further down in the pecking order and and look ultimately I'm just of the opinion that conferences scheduling only games against themselves, doesn't help.
But you know I think what we've seen over the course of time now is that the nine game schedule has hurt the Big Ten in terms of its competitiveness on the national stage for the playoff because teams just beat themselves up too much.
And it ends up being you're almost you're putting too much of strength upon strength and not keeping in mind that at the end of the day, then the football playoff committee is going to be looking almost entirely at wins and losses and even a good loss is going to resonate negatively more than a win against an average report team and you can argue all you want about whether or not that's right or wrong.
What doesn't change is that that's still how it's going to be looked at whether or not you think it's right or wrong. And so, I hope that I would think tank goes the other direction. Honestly. I think they should schedule. Eight games. Not nine. I do think a pod based system would make a lot of sense. I think the chances of them dropping back to to an eighth game is almost almost. It's basically not going to happen.
Like there's no way that they would let it at this point, but I do think that that's the direction they should go. And certainly, if the choice is between 8 9 or 10, I would opt for eight and then nine and then way down the list, it would be 10. So that was an interesting question, though. And I do think that it's going to be interesting to watch this. I you team as they kind of move through this new formation of the Big Ten, how they fit into
the equation. You know, the whatever scheduling they have to switch to is going to be better than the current system. I feel Almost 100% certain in saying that and so that's that's just That's My Hope. Anyway, some other questions. We some from From just some, bro. Why is it so hard to build a credible offensive line? It's not, it's not like there's ways to build credible offensive lines.
There's there's ways to do this, you know, you see it all over the country and you're, you know, you're always going to have lines that underperform you know in a given year. But IU has had a subpar offensive line under the entire Tom Allen tenure there's really no way of getting around that. At and it's been subpar in Divergent areas. You know, some years it's really bad in pass blocking and it's okay and run blocking some years.
It's the opposite some years, it's bad in both and ultimately you know, my all the people that asked that question, I think I know exactly where you're going with it and you're probably right. It's just not that hard. I mean you we were we were talking with Our friend Taylor Layman. We had been exchanging some stuff for a couple of weeks ago about offensive line numbers.
And looking at how Pro Football, Focus rates the offense of wine and you know, you look at IU overall, And since 2017, you know, you can just go right down the list in 2017, which of course, I you missed a bowl by one year, one game that year in run blocking, I use overall rating. For that year was 118th out of 130, teams pass, blocking was 96 that of 130 in 2018, where they also missed a bowl 54th and run
blocking 84th in pass blocking. So just very slightly above the median level in run blocking that year, but worse and pass 2019. And they did go to a bowl that year run blocking 114th little bit of a miss you know. Well you can look at that and you can say why they were terrible at run blocking. They also didn't try to run the ball that off and that year because of caelin deboers offensive approach, but even on that in that year past walking,
they were 67th, you know? So right around the median level and that's really unfortunate the next year 2020. Run blocking 61st pass blocking 124. Earth and that was the year that Indiana had, you know, their best year in the last 50 years. Last year, run blocking 67, pass blocking 82nd and then this year so far run blocking 108 and pass blocking 97th like it is it is a consistent issue.
And look I just we know you can go around and look at other programs and other teams and generally speaking, some kind of an alteration to the approach of the scheme with the offensive line or the Development of the offense of wine is made. When you have that many years of being, you know, at best, a
middling offensive line. And it's just unfortunate because, you know, when you think about this Indiana team and the amount of good skill position players, they've had at quarterback at running back at wide receiver, the under performance of the offense, almost in every case can be traced back to the offensive line, not being able to do what it It needs to do. And you know, if you look at, you know, pass blocking for instance and you, you break it
down to Joe, just what's going on in the Big Ten. You know what you find is? That Indiana's offensive line is is just absolutely it struggles in pretty much every single capacity, not just compared to others, you know, in the country but also Scared to what you would get across the board in the in the Big Ten. It's just it's not it's not a good situation all around like so you will go through and look at at the way the conference is performed.
If you look at pass blocking Indiana right now is 13th in the conference. In pass, blocking rating on Pro Football. Focus, Iowa is the only team that has a worse rating in pass. Blocking, you look at run blocking Indiana is last in the conference in pass, blocking and biased. Any significant margin, like their rating is forty. Six point nine, and run blocking. The next worst is Purdue at 55.5, and that's its significantly behind everybody
else in the conference. And, you know, you can go back and look at previous years and it's a similar sort of tail. And it's, so it's really, it is not that difficult to build a decent offense of wine. Unfortunately Indiana just cannot seem to figure it out and, you know, they are
consistently 10th or worse. Conference pretty much every single year in both categories and so a different approach needs to be taken on this and it just does not seem to be resignated resonating with the program. How much the offensive line has held back. The team over the course of the last several years and it's again it's not any one person or even any one group. This is just a very consistent thing that we've seen with this program, you know, through a few recruiting Cycles.
Now is we're in the 2022. To season. We had a question from Dave and he'd listened to the podcast that we did earlier in the week. And his question was or more of a statement a thought on Elio and Vibes are we only getting a specific type of talent and isolating the rest? I e0, you know, is there a love and loyalty pitch versus a winds
and visibility and growth pitch? And so this really related back to this question that we had gotten from from Jared over it assembly call about whether Elio was a Long-term strategy from a wins and losses perspective. Could you build a winning program on that? And you know, this is where someone threw out like Clemson is built a program that's kind of based on that. I still don't know if I totally agree with that but I get where that person is coming from you
know. But I think the problem ultimately the it's not the Elio thing, I think sometimes gets too much attention and I think that it's a great rallying cry for people who He's a very likable, football program, and a very likeable coach and it's a point of derision for people who just want a winning program and think that the Elio stuff is kind of too cutesy or to Wholesome in a you know in a kind of a Waltons sort of of way. And I think that both of those perspectives kind of miss the
forest for the trees. You know, the Elio stuff I think is a nice marketing pitch and and certainly it's an ethic You know, I'm not saying it's just a marketing pitch but I think it's when it gets down to the end of the day. What wins football games? Ultimately is execution. And that's really where, I think, Tom Allen's teams have tended to fall down. We just talked about it with the
offensive line. I mean, you've got a unit there, that is not executed over the course of time and all the love for each other is not going to change that now. That doesn't mean that preaching Elio as an ethic and a way to Run your program is bad. It just means that it can't, it doesn't conquer everything. You know. Love might conquer all in the animated Robin Hood movie.
But in football I mean love is a I think it's a welcoming aspect and an unusual aspect and one that certain coaches are trying to play up because there's this kind of counter Element of football right now where instead of the traditional like Junction boys, like we're going to go get our asses run into the ground and get screamed at all the time.
You know it version of being a football player, you want to go somewhere and feel valued as a person and I think that you could even shrug or laugh at that but I do think that that actually doesn't matter to a lot of younger players now. And it should, you know, I think the, you know, I've always felt the idea that you should go play football somewhere and be treated like a piece of shit for four years. By a coach because that's going to bring the best out of you.
I do think that's a very Antiquated thought process from a psychological perspective and I think for a lot of players they just they don't want. They want to at least be assured that that's not going to be happening at the place that they go. Now. You know, you're not going to turn down a scholarship to an Alabama or Georgia, you're going to want to go there because, you know, they're going to make you better.
But I think there's a broad middle of College football where they've got a bunch of options and they may not look that distinguishable from one another. You know what I mean? How do you really pick between an Indiana? And I don't know, like, you know, like a Wake Forest or something like that? That may be a bad example but you get what I'm saying?
Like outside of that top Echelon of 10 to 15 teams psychologically is a recruit, you know if it's not money, you know, is it culture is culture, what you're looking for? Is that You're going to make your decision about what you do and where you go. And so I do think that you do you get an honest, and you might get a different type of recruiting, a positive way using Elio as a sales pitch, that you might not get if you weren't doing that.
And there's no question that Tom Allen, if you compare his recruiting successes in terms of raw numbers to what Kevin Wilson was bringing in or what Bill Lynch was bringing in, it's better. I mean, the numbers are better. The rated the player ratings are better. There's better overall Talent from an objective scale from people who don't necessarily care about IU football. And I do think that that demonstrates that that approach and how Tom Allen and bodies it does resonate among players.
I think the bigger issue though is if you're bringing, you know, a three star caliber player and you don't develop him enough so that he's playing like a four-star by the time he leaves. Well, that really wasn't better recruiting than the coach who brought a two star player in and recruited them up. Play like a three or four star player.
And that's where, you know, I do worry about the development on this team long-term now that we've had several years to look at it. And look at how players have developed. You know, for every Mike McFadden who obviously develops, you've got two or three relatively highly regarded players who just never particularly performed at the level you would have expected them to after three or four years, you know?
And so I think to Dave's question ultimately You're probably not getting as good at a quality of recruit without the Elio pitch that Tom Allen's got out there but I also don't know if the end result is necessarily equating to a whole lot different than if you weren't getting those players in the first place but you were approaching it from a different way and really focusing on development and and really
seeing results from that aspect. So you know look I think ultimately for fans they're going to be primarily interested in. How does Tom And make me feel about my football program up to a point for some, not all for some that's all that matters. How does Tom Allen make me feel about my football program for others.
They'll do that until they feel like Tom Allen isn't actually moving the ball forward and their football program is underperforming versus what they think that it should be doing and that is ultimately the big question mark moving forward. For Allen is, you know, can they shake off what?
I've seen here recently in the last year and and and frankly kind of what we've seen over the first couple of games of this year just in terms of overall performance and start to re Elevate to for the program to where it was four years ago or three years ago or three years ago and two years ago, I guess it hasn't been that long A couple other questions real quick before we wrap things up. One thing I will say not so much a question, but Bill Connelly has been posting the box scores
for these IU games and it's great. Like if you've never followed bills Twitter feed its at ESPN underscore Bill. See Bill does a great job using his SP plus ratings and looking at averages and breakdowns of individual. Ox core elements. And and you know that, for those of you who are out there that are skeptical of IU football, this is a great illustration. I think these box scores of why your skepticism makes a lot of
sense. Indiana, really struggling offensively despite running a lot of plays in that. Cincinnati game, only three point four yards per play, which is real bad. I mean, that is really below average rushing, I think something like 65 percent. Point of I use Russia's were five or fewer yards. 44.7% of I use rushes were 40 or scuse me 10 or fewer yards.
I mean this is a team that was just absolutely unable to run the ball and passing wise as Dustin dope, Iraq has mentioned in his pieces Indiana's, completing passes but not an efficient rate, 47 percent completion percentage in that. Cincinnati game, a 45 percent pressure rate, allowed a 0% explosive player. Eight in the possessions immediately surrounding halftime, which is not good 16 plays of third and seven or more. We talked about that on the last podcast.
This is an offense, that's really, really struggling. And this has been clearly on the mind of. A lot of you folks out there because we've gotten a lot of questions about, you know, what is, what is, what is Walt Bell? Do, what is this Indiana team do? Like, how do they overcome this? And yeah. Are you hype man? Asked a bunch of questions related to this? How do you feel? About Walt bills. Offense is the o-line fixable what's Darren Hiller's contract look like I mean I don't know
what the contract looks like. I assume it's a lifetime contract at this point so I really am not sure what the answer is on. That is the o-line fixable I know I don't think so at this point, it Punk John pod had a really nice series of tweets. It's nice to see them talking about. Are you football again? But one of the things that they mentioned was you know, for large stretches of the Cincinnati.
It just felt like I you didn't even have its best five out there and you obviously you lose your top offensive linemen to injury earlier on this year and that does put you behind the eight ball a little bit. But the idea that the line is this bad really makes you wonder, you know, is this like how like where's the where's the Improvement? Going to come from. So you know, when someone asks is the o-line fixable I don't know that it is.
I mean, this is already we 54 Indiana in terms of games. So You threw a third of the Season already? Like, why would game five be significantly better or different than game four? And yes, you can say, well, you know, they can improve during the season, but so, can the opponents? And now, there is what? 240 minutes of game film on this IU offensive wine, obviously, they haven't been out for the full 240 minutes of the games, but there's four games worth of game film.
You're starting to really be able to hone in on where the weaknesses are, you know? That you can really overpower the center position. If you're an opponent and I just I've seen nothing out of Indiana's. Offensive wine coaching or developmental process over the last six years that would make me think. Oh, this line is going to get progressively better as the season goes along. Hope I'm wrong. I just don't see it as a situation where Indiana is going
to like magic. We start to get better. And so it going back to the question of how I feel about Walt bills offense, I think Walt Bell. Is doing about the best he can with what he's got. This certainly feels like a more thoughtful offense than what Nick Sheridan ran out there. And it does remind me a little bit of deboers offense. It's not as elegant as devore's offense, but I also think Deboer had a better team to work with. So it's hard to judge Apples to Apples, you know, I mean the
board is some degree. I think was cognizant of the fact that the offensive line was Real problem at least in run blocking and everything. Got shifted around to try to accommodate that fact and I don't know that Walt Bell has quite figured out how to do that yet, you know, even with that, I think his offense has performed well enough. Given the problems that they're facing from a scheme in
Personnel set. But I also say this, I really, really worried right now the way that the offensive line is struggling and the way that so much of the offense is predicated Cheated on having to throw the ball the time I worry about Connor basil, act being able to make it through the entirety of the rest of the season healthy.
I mean, he's he's getting pressured constantly, he's constantly having to make throws, you know, he's it's led to some interceptions obviously and I don't think that's an offense issue as much as it is. A you know you don't have time. You got to get the ball out. What are you gonna do? Take a sack, you know how to strip sack for a score for Cincinnati in the last game and that was entirely due to the offensive line crumbling at the wrong. Time. It's just a consistent thing.
And when you get right down to it, I don't know what you can do as an offensive coordinator. If you have that kind of an offensive line set up and you don't have like God level play makers at the wide receiver position that can help to compensate for that. Certainly I think targeting the tight ends more might be helpful. That seems to be something that I you have struggled to do so far on the season. But overall I think Bells offense is oohing about as well as it can given.
What it's been dealt, we did have one other question. I wanted to get to here and this one was from Daddy, who's your XD? What should Tom Allen's intro music? Be when he walks out of the tunnel, this one I thought was pretty humorous. We had a couple of kind of humorous. Responses Darren Englehart, suggested, Burn It To The Ground, by Nickelback. Someone suggested, Light Em Up hope is not a strategy recommended. You've got another thing Comin by Judas Priest, which I Really
enjoyed, I don't know. I thought about this a lot and I keep coming back to one answer and it just kind of to me it fits. I think it should be like a rock. I feel like we've not heard that song. It was, you know, it was essentially omnipresent on every car or truck commercial in the mid-90s for what, like six years, you know. But I think that That's a classic Bob Seger song Ang and it just feels like something that Tom Allen would vibe too.
And, you know, it's a mid 80s country song and IT, projects, toughness, and stoicism and standing. In the face of adversity, plus, it's called like a rock, which would fit perfectly at Memorial Stadium for obvious reasons. So, that's my choice would be Tom, Allen's walkout.
Music should be like a rock by Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band. I would be curious to hear Everybody else has suggestions are on that but I think my mind is made up. We have to ask Scott about this on the next podcast and see what he has to say. Last question that we had and it really came down to like how we feel this game is going to go today. You know, what's the prediction? And this is a really tough one.
I I've gone back and forth a lot about this game and what, you know what, what makes the most sense in terms. Zuv who we think is going to perform well and how it all shakes out. Overall, I think Indiana, it's hard for me to to really take Indiana seriously as a team that can win on the road until they do it again. Yes, you know, I rattled off at the beginning, they've won several Road games in the conference under Tom Allen and certainly deserves some credit for that.
But the last one was that Wisconsin game in 2020, you know? Look at all the metrics. I use defense has ranked 110th in the nation right now. Nebraska's is ranked 97th. That's a cause for some optimism. The problem is I use offense is rank. 114th in the nation Nebraska's is ranked 30th, and yes, Indiana has played a much tougher schedule, then Nebraska. But, you know, Nebraska's got a much more balanced offense. Nebraska is about a 49 to 51 ratio, run to pass.
Indiana is a 35 to 65 ratio. Pass. And when you look at the way that I, you has performed up to this point, it's hard for me, at least to see a route to victory for Indiana because ultimately, the problems that Indiana has, yes, Nebraska has, but I think Nebraska has definitely shown an ability to move the ball better. And I really worry about the way Indiana. Secondary has played over the course of really the whole season getting torched.
For that of many points in the through the air against Cincinnati was a real bad sign. And yes they tightened it up in the second half but you know it's I don't know why you wouldn't have been fired up to to play Cincinnati on the road after what happened last year. And the fact that Cincinnati you know it was a ranked team at the start of the season was ranked coming into the game. It was an ESPN game or ESPN2.
I mean for the defense to come out that flat in the secondary and struggle is As they did, the fact that they made adjustments, that made it less bad in the second half time. I'm not going to give them a lot of points for that. So I just worry that there's too many things pointing in the favor of Nebraska in this game to feel confident about picking
Indiana to win. I do think Indiana's got a good chance to cover and I think five and a half is probably slightly too big of a margin and I could certainly see this game ending up as like a 31-28 game or a 34 to 30. Gain as opposed to being one where Nebraska is winning by a touchdown or more because this Nebraska teams got a lot of psychological issues that they have to work through. So I guess that's where I'm going to land.
I think Indiana will cover. I think Nebraska will win and it's a shame because I think it's going to be one of those games at the end. We're all sitting around saying that was a game. Indiana should have won. That was a game. They were they left it on the table and again, I hope I'm wrong but that just feels like
the rhythm of this team. This year where A game like that, you know, a 34-point game, they'll probably win those if they have them at home but I think they'll lose them on the road because I just don't think that they've got what it takes at this point to go and win on the road, even at a place like, Nebraska where, you know, there's there's a team that struggling, but on the flip side, you've got great fans in the stands. That's going to be a sold-out
stadium. And I think it probably a group that's like, this might be our last hurrah for a victory, this year at home. Home. Let's try to make the most of it anyway. That'll wrap it up for us here on Crimson cast.
Hopefully this got you through the afternoon a little bit and hopefully Indiana proves me wrong and goes out and does what they need to do and picks up their fourth win of the Season as they take on the Nebraska Cornhuskers Indiana 1 and 3 against the spread this year Nebraska Owen for against the spread. So something's got to give one way or another on that. So we'll see what happens on
that. Aunt. I hope all you folks have a good rest of the day be sure to tune in. We will be back tomorrow morning as we talk through what went on with the Indiana. Nebraska game will talk through the upcoming game a little bit that Indiana is going to have as they have to come back home and take on Michigan during homecoming. And we'll also talk a little bit about just, I guess the beginning of Indiana basketball season, believe it or not.
It is coming up here. Very quickly, as Hoosier hysteria is less than a week away at this stage. Thanks to all you folks for joining me. Once again, we'll be back on Crimson cast later on this week with more information and talk about IU football and basketball as well. We'll catch you folks on the flip side, bring back the Bison. So long, everybody.