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Any chance Self might be in play? Not sure if the Big 12 will have as much pull as the SEC or the BT and maybe to keep up in the arms race he makes a move? I know Adidas keep him in a good spot but just wondered.

Is this becoming more than it is or do we know he negotiated a lower buyout? Do we know he passed on L’ville because of the desire for a lower buyout or is this just hopes becoming “facts”? If those are known strategies and desires in his part it is pretty interesting for sure. Is his buyout higher if he is fired (not that that will happen but it would help support the argument that he did negotiate this intentionally.

Could have had an uncle and nephew had Woody came a few years earlier

Good win tonight. I wish this would be a copy and paste for how to approach remaining games but this team seems to be full of guys who play great for a game and are a disaster the next. What really helped the last 2 games was the effort. How many times the last few years did it look like the team did not care. Currently we have several guys willing to dive on the floor (even jump on opponents laying on the floor) fighting for loose balls. I love the tips back on rebounds as well. Rice may not be scoring well but his D and penetration and then creating openings for others are all effort driven. So I will not be surprised if next game Ballo and MM have a combined 10 points but Rice and Gallo get 30. Good to see the effort. Good to get a road win. This win is to be expected though if we are going to have a good to great season. Does not mean we have figured things out yet but big ten road wins against average to good teams are still good wins.

The new GM, unless they know they can get their #1 guy, kind of gets a free pass with Steichen. They can say sure I will keep him for another year and if he works out great. If not they then get to bring their guy in. It is kind of like getting a free try with Steichen.

Are we talking ourselves into thinking this portal class is great? Could be way off but it seems last years was better on paper and ended up being very good. Is this class for 2025 considered better and if so why?

It’s a new kind of arms race in college athletics. It used to be based on getting money for facilities to stay up with or ahead of the pack. Better facilities, in theory, better recruiting and coaches. Now, it is money for NIL. But these donors seem to have a stronger voice in who the coach will be. Will the money dry up if we keep Woody and keep being basically a top 35-50 team? Or do those donors give only because of his influence and relationship? How do you keep part of the donor base happy if they want to move on while another important group wants to keep the coach. Dolson has a lot of experience working with these groups so he is probably a great guy to handle it. Hopefully he can find a way to “honor” Woody with an exit plan that keeps important donors happy and gets us back on a winning track.

The problem i have with Leal is while he can give you some valuable minutes in a game here or there he usually only does one thing helpful in those games. Yesterday he played good D but was largely neutral on the offensive end. It would sure help if he gave some scoring, had some assists or at a minimum shot FT better than 62%.

I think this can be misleading as he played in mop up minutes for a lot of the wins. It would be more beneficial to see his +/- impact in games where the final score is close.

I am not expecting it at all but it is not impossible either. The BT’s highest ranked team is Oregon at #9 and we have 3 others in the top 25. Not nearly as deep a conference as we have had in prior years. Woodson teams have also had stretches where they have played very well. Usually late in the year after underperforming for most of the year. There is enough talent on this team to end up with double digit wins in a conference without that many unbeatable teams. Will they do it, unlikely but for now there is a path. They could easily start off 4-1 in conference and perhaps that confidence leads to better performance. It could also lead to overconfidence and one of those losing streaks Woodsons team have also been known for.

I don’t really disagree but there is a path currently to the tournament should we go 12-8 or 13-7. If we start off with a home loss to one of the easier teams on this schedule it makes the path much less likely.

Weird at this point in the year but this is really a must win game for Indiana. Home game vs a “lesser” team should be a win and given the lack of big wins so far they cannot afford to lose tonight. I would not be surprised to see a shorter lineup. A win, especially a close win, does not really tell us much either. A loss though tells a lot and would likely be the precursor to the wheels falling off.

My primary point (though not well made) was that whether it is the pressure of the job, or likely a variety of things, UK did not get their top targets.

I may be wrong but I don’t think Pope was one of the top candidates when the UK job opened up. I know his name was on some lists we had for IU candidates but was down the list, if on it at all. He had success at BYU but was far from a sure thing.

This may be a down year somewhat but really should not be down too far. They still have a lot of talent on that team and Clark is gone from Iowa. They have enough talent to be top 15-20 and it looks like they are starting to play like that.

I think this season where we were genuinely in the playoff discussion the last month of the season took us as fans further than we could have imagined had we just been a top 25 team playing in a bowl. Had the latter happened I think we would have been thrilled but I don’t think many of us could have truly imagined Indiana being a playoff caliber team. Now that we have seen it, tasted it, we can legitimately consider those results. The team, staff and coaches can too. For me that is the advantage we have vs just being in a bowl. I do like the idea of getting a bowl game after the first round since there is so much time.

Seems like his production dropped this year. Any ideas why? Crowded safety room? Injury?

I think Alford is a good to very good coach. He is consistently above his peers at the mid major level and had some success at the P5 level. To excel we need a great coach though.

I was going to make a similar post. UCLA, Kentucky and l’ville come to mind. now that does not mean we can’t overcome that but those examples as well as our attempts should remind us all that it is not as easy as we would expect.

Did Fisch say if they don’t play hard Woodson is done? Fisch never seems critical of an active coach. The team at times but not whoever the current coach is.

Yikes

For those of us who prefer to eat pie vs going back to find a post can you remind us of the Tucker comments.

Good work. He definitely seems well equipped to plug and play QBs

Curious how you know how old Jerry is?

Did he have a lot of transfer QBs before IU? I know he has had all conference QBs frequently but assumed those were generally home grown for some reason.