Exhibition Report No. 1: Indiana 82, Ottawa 54

Indiana coach Tom Crean was looking forward Tuesday night to seeing how his team had improved since the last time it had faced Ottawa during a summer tour of Canada prior to the 2014-15 season.

That year, the Hoosiers had fallen to Ottawa by eight points.

Tuesday night, it was a different looking IU basketball team that took the court for its exhibition opener at Assembly Hall.

Ottawa head coach James Derouin noticed it, too.

IU beat Ottawa Tuesday night 82-54. In doing so the Hoosiers limited Ottawa to almost exactly half of the points it had scored a year ago in a 109-101 victory over the Hoosiers.

Tuesday, IU held Ottawa to 22 second-half points and closed the game on a 25-3 run. While Indiana struggled at times with the same issues that plagued the Hoosiers last season – turnovers and defense – IU looked largely improved.

Derouin was impressed.

“The first thing that jumps to mind (about how this Indiana team is different from last year’s) is the size on the offensive glass,’’ Derouin said. “I thought on the glass especially they were outstanding with 18 offensive rebounds and those extra possessions were huge. And then their defense I thought their rotations and closeouts were much, much tighter than they were a year ago.”

So the man who coaches the top ranked Canadian team had some pretty high praise for the two most questionable facets of the Hoosier’s game. While keyboard warriors may be more critical, the facts indicate that head coach Tom Crean’s team has improved markedly in those areas as it outrebounded Ottawa 46-34 and limited the Gee-Gee’s sharpshooting offense to just 19 percent from the 3-point line.

Sophomore guard James Blackmon Jr. has an idea why the guards were better able to rebound. A lot of the thanks, he believes, belong to Thomas Bryant and Max Bielfeldt’s presence in the game at the same time.

“It is so much different with those two in there, it seems like everything is carved out,” Blackmon Jr. said. “It makes it so much easier for us, I go in to crash the glass and it’s wide open.”

Crean later said he wasn’t sure that the guards graded out so well in terms of offensive rebounding. Whether or not improved rebounding was the intent of the bigger starting lineup, the fact that it was used is intriguing. Last year fans grew tired of a three guard offense that struggled to find defensive success. This year, Blackmon Jr. says he has been adjusting to a bigger lineup.

“We have shot blockers, so I have confidence pressing up on guys,” Blackmon Jr. said. “I know Max and Thomas have our backs.”

That faith in teammates is a crucial part of help defense. Crean thinks while having faith in one another is important, the rotations have to improve after this game.

“There is no question we got spread out a little too much and had to give too much help, but I liked our recovery,’’ Crean said.

The ultimate goal of Crean’s philosophy is to be close to basketball without defined positions. The roster currently has a mix that of players he feels is closer to that goal than in years prior.

“They can all shoot, they’re getting better with their handles although it didn’t look like that tonight at certain times,” Crean said. “If we can get to a place where we can guard different positions then that will really lead you to another place offensively.”

And in its first exhibition game, the Hoosiers showed the benefits of being in Crean’s desired offensive “place.” The team shot 49 percent from the field with five players going for eight or more points. However, all the positives of this exhibition didn’t come without some negative. Indiana struggled to take care of the ball, throwing several errant passes on their way to 17 first half turnovers. The point was corrected at half time as the Hoosiers only had six turnovers in the entire second half. Crean says the difference is thanks to mostly better defense.

“Frankly (it was) better defense for longer periods of time leading to easier baskets for us,” Crean said.

If Indiana can do a complete 180 and find offense because of its defense, this could be an extremely dangerous unit. As it was an exhibition game, you should probably take the Ottawa performance with more than a single grain of salt. The rhythm was a bit chaotic as Crean tried several different lineups. There probably isn’t anything conclusive about this year’s team based off Tuesday night’s play.

So were IU’s guards more physical rebounding the ball Tuesday night or was it a product of the opponent?

“Well we have young guys so it may look like that tonight,’’ Crean said. “I’m not sure its gonna look like that when we play teams in the conference, Maryland, Purdue, Michigan State, Iowa and teams like that.’’

As of now we don’t know much of anything about how this team will compare to last years. Well, other than that Bryant is a whole lot better than last year’s starting center.