Analysis: How much does losing Harris hurt the Hoosiers?

The news hit Indiana football fans like a splash of cold water to the face.

Before Kevin Wilson had even stepped to the podium Thursday afternoon at Big Ten Football Media Day in Chicago, a press release from IU media relations turned out to be the bearer of bad news.

Sophomore wide receiver J-Shun Harris, an impressive young talent expected to carry a major role in the IU offense this fall, has been ruled out for the season with an ACL injury. The former Fishers (Ind.) High School standout will redshirt the 2015 season and come back as a sophomore in 2016.

So how big of a deal is it to lose a player of Harris’s caliber?

Make no mistake, it’s a big deal.

And not only because Harris was the leading returning receiver from a year ago, and not just because he had been penciled in as the starter as both IU’s kickoff and punt returner for the upcoming season.

It’s much more than that.

It’s basically the fact that when you’re an Indiana football team struggling to earn respectability, you already have a small margin of error. Bottom line: This is not the way you wanted to get the season underway even before practice has officially started.

When you’re a college football team that has made one bowl appearance in more than 20 years, you want to have everything working in your favor as you head into the season. In a word, Indiana is a fragile program. It simply can’t afford to lose too many starters.

Especially starters at skill positions.

If you’re Ohio State or Wisconsin or Michigan State, and you lose a key player, it’s much easier to reload. That’s because the talent pool you’re choosing from is at an elite level.

When you’re Indiana, and you lose a key player, you often times have to count on a young player to step in. Maybe it’s a redshirt freshman or quite possibly it’s a true freshman. That’s just the nature of the beast.

For Indiana, replacing Harris means that one of the true freshmen wide receivers could very well be called upon to take a bigger role than perhaps they were expected to take as a freshman this season. Maybe it’s Leon Thornton or Nick Westbrook or Isaac James. All three of those players came to Indiana with impressive high school credentials but in a perfect world you would hope that Indiana gets to the point where it’s a program that can redshirt players like that and let them get properly acclimated to college football.

I’m not trying to pretend that the loss of Harris is as significant as say losing Nate Sudfeld was a year ago six games into the season. That was a back breaker but it was also an experienced quarterback on a team that had very little experience behind him.

At least in the case of Indiana at the wide receiver position, Kevin Johns has assembled a solid group of receivers. In most years in recent memory the wide receiver position has been one of IU’s strongest areas. That will need to be the case again this year.

And one thing that will definitely help the Hoosiers is the fact that Sudfeld is at quarterback and with his precision passing game can take advantage of what the defense gives him. Sudfeld can make up for a lot of inexperience at that position by hitting open receivers.

Still, you never want to lose a key offensive weapon before the season even begins.

I found some of Wilson’s comments in his question and answer period at Big Ten Media Day Thursday interesting when he talked about how his IU team has been preparing for quite some time to play without Harris this season. It turns out the injury occurred in the first week of the summer and the team has kept it quiet internally to this point.

I suppose that’s a plus. At least Sudfeld has had all summer to get on the same page with a lot of different guys who will be asked to contribute in the fall.

Still, the reality here is that Indiana needs to find a way to have a healthy August and move into the 2015 season putting its best foot forward.

Thursday’s news was not on a good first start.

Moving forward IU football fans cannot afford too many similar splashes of cold water to the face.

@IndySportsHutch