BASKETBALL

Mike Woodson wanted ‘these games’ for Indiana basketball. With another massive opportunity on the horizon, he’s looking for more than a ‘bounce back’

Indiana basketball was blown out on Wednesday but faces Gonzaga in what could turn around a terrible start to the week.

Published

10 hours ago

November 27, 2024

Indiana basketball was blown out on Wednesday but faces Gonzaga in what could turn around a terrible start to the week. (Mandatory Credit: Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images)

Zero seconds. That’s the amount of time that Indiana basketball led in Wednesday’s blowout loss to Louisville in the first round of the Battle 4 Atlantis event down in The Bahamas. In an 89-61 ’embarrassing’ loss for Indiana, you can point at a number of stats that led to the loss — but one part of the game that doesn’t show up in the stat sheet is toughness and pride; neither of which Indiana had.

“It was beyond schemes,” IU head coach Mike Woodson said following the loss. “I thought they (Louisville) came out from the very beginning and they punched us and we didn’t respond. And it didn’t get better throughout the game. As the coach, I got to get this team more ready to go, and I’m talking about from beginning to end.”

Indiana has now had notable non-conference losses — both road and neutral sites –of 14 to Arizona, 20 to UConn, 22 to Kansas, 28 to Auburn and then 28 to Louisville. In addition, the two years it made the NCAA Tournament under Mike Woodson, they have lost by 29 to Saint Mary’s and then 16 to Miami.

So, Wednesday’s loss was no surprise in terms of Indiana’s big-game history in Woodson’s tenure, but it was a surprise in terms of how important this week was for this team.

“Well, it’s tough. These are young men, and I get it. But these games are not going anywhere. I mean, we got a game tomorrow night, and we gotta go back and put them through this film session and see if we can learn from it and see if I can get them over the hump and get them back going again for tomorrow night, because these games come so quickly and you can’t run from it,” Woodson said. “So I’m not gonna let them forget this game, because this was embarrassing and you gotta give Louisville credit because they played their butts off, but we didn’t play Indiana basketball, I didn’t think.”

But with bad comes good — and there’s a massive opportunity in front of Indiana as it’ll face No. 3 Gonzaga on Thursday for a chance to redeem Wednesday’s performance.

“We gotta somehow go back and regroup,” Indiana head coach Mike Woodson said following the loss. “That’s the nature of playing college basketball. You get your butt beat like this, you hope you learn … you do have a quick turnaround. We play the [loser] between Gonzaga and West Virginia tomorrow, and we gotta see what we’re made of, see if we can rebound and bounce back.”

The expectation is for this roster to be able to compete with the likes of the Gonzaga’s of the country — not lose by nearly 30 to Louisville, a roster that was entirely flipped under new head coach Pat Kelsey. Mike Woodson said over the summer that this was the most talented team he’s had at Indiana. But, there remains one constant as the consistent big-game losses mount.

Is this team different than years past? Yes. Will they rebound? Time will tell. But, there’s been too many times this type of performance repeats itself.

One game certainly won’t define a season, but Wednesday put a crack in the wall for Indiana basketball. Now it’s about making sure the floodgates don’t open in the early stages of the season and make it unattainable to get back to the expectations and lofty goals this team had and has.

“We work our asses off in practice, and I push guys to do the right thing and you hope when you get to the ball game, everything just kind of flows,” Woodsons added. “Tonight (Wednesday), we went backwards. I just gotta get us going forwards.”