‘That’s a recipe for disaster’: Inside the tale of two runs that made things spiral for Indiana basketball in Nebraska loss

While Indiana basketball played hard, competed and showed great energy for most of the game, there were two key runs that ended any hope for IU to come out of Lincoln with a win on Friday night — one in the first half, and then another late in the second half.

While the 17-point loss doesn’t indicate how close the game was, it’s also an indication to just how critical end of half situations are — and continue to be for Indiana.

Dating back to the start of Mike Woodson’s tenure, end of half and end of game situations have been a weakness of these Indiana basketball teams. Whether it’s a lead that decreases, a deficit that increases or a major swing away from IU, it was no different against Nebraska, leading to its 85-68 loss.

At the 4:09 mark of the first half, Indiana had just taken a four-point lead and had begun to not just settle into the game, but control the tempo the way they wanted.

Then, everything flipped. It was a quick 7-0 run for Nebraska that led to the final 4:09 without the Hoosiers making a field goal. A four-point lead went into a three-point deficit at the half, with Indiana missing its final six shots. Still, despite all of that — it was a half Indiana took many positives from knowing it played 19 of the 20 minutes without its leading scorer in Mackenzie Mgbako, who picked up two quick fouls.

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After an up-and-down second half, with both teams trading blows, it was 64-all with 9:57 left on the clock. That was after 13-straight points by Myles Rice — who scored a team-high 20 points — stopped the early second half bleeding.

“It’s a ballgame with five or six (minutes) on the clock and we just let it get away,” Woodson said following the loss. “And that’s just something that we got to work on because I think when we keep putting ourselves in that position, we’ll have an opportunity to break through and win.”

Letting it get away is exactly what happened.

Indiana went on to get outscored 21-4 the remaining 9:57 — including scoring just one point the final 6:27 of the game.

“We kind of took a couple shots that probably were out of rhythm and we didn’t defend how we should have down the stretch.,” IU guard Myles Rice said. “That’s a recipe for disaster when you put both of those together. We’ve just got to be better going down the stretch, and continue to play as a team and just be better.”

Indiana went scoreless the final 3:09 of game time and were just 1-of-17 from the floor to finish after tying the game.

On the flip side — Nebraska was 6-of-10 to end the game after IU had tied it up. Overall, the Huskers shot 61.2 percent from the floor, 57.7 percent in the second half and averaged 1.323 points per possession after halftime.

“I know defense wins, especially when you’re not making shots it keeps you in the ball game,” Woodson said. “Tonight, they (Nebraska) had it both ways — they made shots and we weren’t very good defensively.”

SEE ALSO: Key takeaways from the Indiana basketball 85-68 loss to Nebraska

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