BASKETBALL

Late game scoring woes, poor execution emerge again as Indiana basketball ‘didn’t regroup’ following momentum-changing 3 from Oregon

Indiana basketball was unable to regroup after a shell-shocking late three changed the momentum and lifted Oregon to a big win.

Published

6 hours ago

March 5, 2025

Alec Lasley

Indiana basketball was unable to regroup after a shell-shocking late three changed the momentum and lifted Oregon to a big win. (Craig Strobeck-Imagn Images)

Indiana basketball entered Tuesday night knowing exactly what Oregon was going to do — shoot, and make 3s. There was no confusion on that and the Ducks started where they had left off over the last few weeks draining three of their first six attempts. Then things flipped.

After making just two of the next nine attempts to close out the half, Oregon made just one three in the second half, going 1-of-9 in the final 20 minutes. But, that one three was the biggest shot from either team all night — a go-ahead near 35-footer by Jackson Shelstad with four seconds on the shot clock that gave the Ducks a 66-64 lead with 1:29 on the game clock.

“I don’t think – we didn’t defend it well,” IU head coach Mike Woodson said following the game. “We didn’t, because (Nate) Bittle caught the ball up top, Anthony (Leal) was sucked in and all he had to do was stay out. We did not defend it well. I mean, (we need to ) make Bittle be the guy that beats you. Jackson (Shelstad) has shown he can make shots and beat you. And he did. It was a big shot when we were up one.”

Shelstad entered Tuesday shooting 47.4 percent from three in Big Ten games and Oregon was shooting 40.8 percent from three across the last six games.

Indiana had just hit a Trey Galloway three on the opposite end to go up 64-63 with 1:58 remaining before surrendering the lead on the next possession. It changed the outcome of the game and IU wasn’t able to regroup.

Those three points were the final points of the game for the Hoosiers, with a 10-0 spurt for Oregon to close.

“I thought we were right there man. We were up one with three or four minutes on the clock,” Woodson said. “I mean, the kid hits a big bucket, and then we just didn’t regroup from that point on. And you gotta give them credit because their defense picked up when it needed to. They got a big steal out of our possession, and we threw it away. So I mean, that was the difference in the game I thought coming down the stretch.”

In a game that neither team was able to stretch out past one or two possessions for the majority of the night, saw 10 lead changes, including eight in the final 13:21 of the game.

Indiana, however, failed to match the big-play mentality from Oregon in the critical moments — a story that has unfolded all too many times this season. After taking a 59-57 lead at the 8:19 mark of the second half, Indiana would go just 2-of-12 to finish the game, including seven straight misses after taking that two-point lead.

“I just thought we poorly executed our offense, and we had good calls, good play calls made, but we just didn’t – they took us out of it,” Woodson said. “That’s something that we gotta learn from. When it’s nut-cutting time, you gotta step up and make plays, which we’ve been doing. We’ve been making good basketball plays down the stretch, but tonight we didn’t.”

Still, despite the mid-game shooting struggles, Indiana was again, in the lead before the Shelstad three. But, that shell-shocking moment for Indiana led to the momentum shift that decided the game.

And, it was another opportunity that Indiana basketball let slip away.

“It was a one-point game with three or four minutes on the clock,” Woodson added. “We get that stop, he hits a bomb on us. You know? Got them back the momentum they needed to secure the game. We just didn’t regroup from that. We struggled from that shot (on).”

Now, it’s an ever-critical moment for Indiana on Saturday in the regular season finale. A match against Ohio State — winners of two in a row and in the same scenario that IU finds itself in; once again squarely on the bubble.

While neither a win or a loss will solidify IU’s postseason fate, a win would certainly releases some of the pressure entering the Big Ten Tournament. A loss? Well that would put Indiana potentially back on the wrong side of the bubble, or at the very least, put the bid-stealing teams back in play for the Hoosiers.