BGleas

Just my opinion, but I don't think going big is the answer, IU shouldn't be slowing things down they should be speeding things up. What I would like too see is a more skilled, explosive lineup. I'd go something like Phinisee, Green (I know, I get it, you could also put Durham here), Langford, Morgan, Moore. I think you want Morgan (better shooter, better ball handler, more skilled) in that Smith role. With this lineup you have guys that can create, and to varying degrees shoot, at 4 of the 5 spots, and Moore has shown an ability to hit the offensive glass. I think this lineup is faster and has the ability to be more explosive.

I don’t how Smith could play on the wing/3. He hasn’t show any ability to handle the ball, shoot the ball or even remotely take care of the ball. Putting him on the perimeter even more and in even more situations to handle the ball doesn’t sound like a good idea.

One of my biggest worries for this game is that it's our first neutral site game. We already struggle to shoot from distance as a team, and sometimes these NBA arenas take some adjusting to. I know we scrimmaged Loyola in Banker's Life, but it's not the same as a game. I could see IU coming out early missing shots and getting down. Hopefully we attack the rim early, get some easy buckets and get our shooters to the foul line (yes, I know we struggle there too) to get some shots going through the nets for confidence.

Context is important here though. I have no idea why Edwards wasn't participating, but I highly doubt it's just him saying, 'nope, I don't feel like running.' I'm sure there's a reason behind it. Obviously this isn't the reason for Edwards, but my senior year of high school my coach would sometimes have me sit out portions on practice. I was tall (6'6") and lanky (190lbs) and played huge minutes, basically only coming out if I was in foul trouble, and I lost a lot of weight at the beginning of the season (dropped to 170 in 3 weeks), so it was more of a preservation move by our coach. I'd sit out gym class (coach was gym teacher) also and eat and watch film and sit out of some running during practice. Again, that's not the reason for Edwards obviously, just saying sometimes it's a decision by the staff to preserve a guy who has a high minutes/usage rate. It's a long season and you don't want to burn him out. You do run the risk of some chemistry issues of course, but I'd be surprised if it's just Edwards opting out, that would actually shock me.

Or 1981

I'm an Archie fan and think IU finally has the right guy, etc., but with that said if there's something I'm a little surprised by or maybe disappointed in to this point it's that the team/program hasn't really adopted his identity yet. I think we'd have a little more "dog" in us because of the type of player Archie was and the type of coach he seems to be, but I haven't really seen that happen yet. In his defense, the roster does have a lot of just naturally laid back guys, so maybe it's just the hand we're dealt right now. It's not easy to change someone's mentality as far as that goes, sometimes you are who you are. But, I was hoping to see a little more of Archie's identity by this point.

It's not really about 'allowing it'. Guys are playing basketball, sometimes a lane is there and you make a move and it works, other times the defense reacts quickly and what was an open lane to the basket turns into a 1-on-3. It's not like Archie is telling them to take 1-on-3 shots, it's just guys reading plays and sometimes they make the wrong read. The problem comes in when they're not improving in their reads, which you can make a case that Green hasn't improved in this area at all during his career, while Phinisee is still young, does it less often, and will most likely improve.

Gotcha, thanks for explaining. My opinion, but I don’t even consider Durham a point guard.

But he’s not a point guard, and currently isn’t playing point guard ahead of either of those guys.

Really curious as to why you have Durham ahead of RP and Green as a point guard, or was it not in depth chart order?

Appreciate your reply, and I'm not trying to come off as an 'Archie apologist' or act like he's above criticism. I've been disappointed in some things. For example, I haven't seen our program yet play with what appears to be Archie's identity. I thought we'd begin to see that sooner this year, though again injuries may impact that. But, we all know with certain coaches when you watch their team you get that 'the mentality of the coach is clear by how the players are playing' feeling and we haven't really seen that. Also, look at what Coach K did Tuesday. He knew we had a freshmen backcourt and would be in a hostile environment and he knew we struggled with pressure against Arkansas, so he comes our and pressures fullcourt from the tip. It was a great move. I haven't seen Archie really do many things like that to this point. It's basically pack-line and that's it. So, I'd like to see more of those types of adjustments. With all that said, I think Archie has a good chance to finally be Indiana's answer, and I've seen way more things that give me optimism, so I'm going to give him time and have patience with it, and I really do think we'll be happy sooner than later.

Would love to see an alternate uniform with the Indiana cursive script.

Nobody is jumping on you, you made a point about Beilein and I'm responding to it. Beilein took over Michigan as a much more experienced coach than Archie when he took over IU, and it took Beilein 6+ season to really have any success at Michigan. In 11 seasons at Michigan he's missed the tournament or been bounced before the Sweet Sixteen 7 times. He's finished 7th or worse in the conference 5 times, including finishing 8th or worse twice in the last 4 seasons. The point is, Beilein has had some great seasons at Michigan but he's also had some bad ones, even recently, and it took him nearly 6 seasons to get it going. Patience is the point. If Michigan reacted to Beilein after 1+ seasons he would have been fired, but they knew they had a good coach and they were patient and they're reaping the benefits. This is where most want to point to Crean and how the admin was patient with him and it burned us, but Archie isn't Crean. Archie is a basketball lifer. Archie has already proven IMO that he's a good basketball coach, but implementing a new program takes time, as it did for Beilein, Bennett, Coach K, Jay Wright, Izzo, etc. They all struggled early at their current schools. I'm not saying it's easy. I get frustrated too, but the injuries have absolutely, 100% impacted the teams play early this year. Let's give this team a chance to get healthy and develop, and as hard as it is let's have some patience and let Archie build this thing.

Beilein went 46-53 his first three seasons at Michigan finishing no higher than 7th in the conference, and it took six years at Michigan to get past the 2nd round of the tournament.

Anytime you remove anywhere from 4-6 scholarship players from a team the play is going to suffer. When you remove maybe the best defender in the conference as well as the 2nd best defender on the team the defense is going to suffer. When you remove the highest IQ guy and the only veteran point guard on the team, the offense and turnovers are going to suffer. That was all McRoberts and Green, I didn’t even get to Davis, Hunter and Thompson. With all those guys injured it’s not only the play that suffers but so does practice and preparation. We dismantled a Marquette team that some think can win the Big East. We lost on a missed layup and tip in at Arkansas against a team that presses in a tough environment when we had a freshmen backcourt and were missing our best defender and backup point guard. We’re a couple injuries and a missed tip-in from being 6-1 and ranked. We need to have some patience. It’s not easy, but we can’t let Archie pay for the fauilures of Davis, Sampson and Crean. Several of the top coaches in college basketball struggles their first 2-3 years at their current schools, including Coach K, Beilein, Tony Bennett, Izzo, and many more.

I'm assuming you're referring to the UTA and UC Davis games? I don't think it's either of those things. We were short handed, missing our best defender and back-up point guard (also probably our 2nd best defender) while playing 3 games in 6 days over a holiday break. IMO, nothing more, nothing less. Get the guys healthy again, refocus, and I think we'll see this team back to what we all hoped.

There’s no doubt Beilein is a really good coach. But IMO what you’re seeing at Michigan is what happens when you know you have a good coach and as a program you have patience. The same is happening at Villanova. Both coaches have had ups and downs at their schools, Michigan I believe had a year where they won the Big Ten and lost in the first round. Wright has had years where he missed the tournament all together. But, both schools knew they had good coaches, didn’t overreact and had patience. This isn’t directed at you, just using your post as a jumping point, but I’ve seen some fans on various boards freaking out over the Arkansas loss, saying fans will be attacking Archie if we don’t make a deep tourney run. I think that’s crazy, IU has a really good, young coach, and while it’s hard given the last 30 years, I think if everyone has some patience we’ll be really happy.

Agree, I couldn’t figure out how that wasn’t over the back either. The ref was standing right there. The other call that I thought was awful was the travel they called on Davis with a minute or two left. Gafford completely flopped, and then Davis didn’t travel he was tripped by Gafford who had flopped onto the ground.

Agree completely. I love what Phinisee did there, he and Davis just didn’t make the shot. I love that as a freshmen, playing in his 3rd game in an environment like that and alongside ‘headliners’ like Morgan and Langford, that Phinisee had the stones to be aggressive and make a play. That’s going to pay dividends for several years.

Kind of BS that De Sousa has to sit out but Bill Self doesn't?!?! So we punish the kid until a review is done, but the multimillion-dollar coach who is on record having known about paying players gets to keep coaching?

Remember Moses Abraham? He came to IU on an official and all the word leaking was that he wanted to commit on his visit, but his parents convinced him to wait until a couple days after he got home. Georgetown was the main competition, and the story went that John Thompson, Sr. (long retired at that point) was waiting at the airport when Abraham got back from IU. Seems crazy that a coach’s father can recruit for him.

This can all cut both ways. I was reading on message boards a couple weeks before Franklin's visit that a commit (not a specific name, but a commit would be soon) from someone was close to happening. So might sound crazy, but maybe the staff knew some things before we did on or after Franklin's visit on the 25th. Then as Franklin's visit approached chatter started coming in that he would likely commit after the visit. That chatter started before his visit, not after. As far as a guy like Shedrick, he was said to have interest in IU and then made a quick commitment to Virginia. Who knows why that offer was made and/or why his attention went to Virginia so quickly? Could be Archie really wanted him but he fell in love with Virginia, and could also be he felt TJD was the priority and likely to come to IU, probably a combination. I'm not saying Archie is some recruiting wizard that is playing chess while everyone else is playing checkers, nor am I saying that TJD and Brooks are 100% locks, just saying the strong indications are that they are IU leans, TJD probably much bigger than Brooks, and that Archie seems to not have lined up any backup plans, which is not like him. I'm sure the long list of guards IU went after over the summer weren't all cooled on because Archie cooled, a few probably didn't have a ton of interest for a variety of reasons, but I still think over the summer Archie narrowed on TJD, Brooks and a guard, and as the summer winded down things came into focus that Franklin would likely commit and IU was really close on TJD and Brooks, close enough to warrant basically going 'all-in'.

Not trying to "in Archie we trust" you, but the timeline is telling. Brooks and TJD were always the main priorities, while Archie has also kept varying degrees of touch with Stewart, Hurt and Watford. Then this summer he did hand out the guard schollies a little bit like candy with Franklin, Newman, Bouknight, Harris, Ramsey, Leque, etc. But, once it began coming clear that Franklin was going to commit, almost all connection with IU and those other guards died down. I might be giving the staff too much confidence, but seems to me they always wanted TJD, Brooks, and a guard in the Fall, and then the Watford, Hurt, Steward group is Spring gravy is there's room. It's telling to me that there really are no backup plans (kids in the 50-150 range) for TJD and Brooks right now for the Fall period.

This why I’m confident all the message board chatter on TJD and Brooks will come to fruition, because it appears that Archie has backed off of any sort of back-up plans.

To this point out of the blue bloods, looks like Bill Self is getting outed the most. I hope the Nike stuff hits soon, no way UNC, Duke and UK aren't doing this and maybe even more.