Aaron

Almost certainly yes, but not 100%. 1. A win in week 17 over Raiders officially clinches no matter what for Colts. However, for a win over the Jags in week 18 to clinch a playoff spot with a loss to the Raiders, Indy would need: 1. The Ravens or Patriots to lose in week 17 or 18, 2. Raiders to lose in week 18 3. Ravens to win out and the Bengals lose out. If Raiders go 2-0, Ravens 2-0, Patriots 2-0 and Bengals at least 1-1, an Indy win over Jacksonville still leaves Colts on outside looking in.

What in the world does this have to do with what I said? I talked about how teams can easily abuse testing protocols and you are talking about the genetics of the virus. Those are not remotely related.

Until the NCAA does something to take over the testing, you are going to see the wild west of COVID cancellations with college. By letting the teams themselves police it, you will have some teams not test at all, some call off a game down their two best players testing positive but play if they have three guys at end of bench test postive, some may test all players everyday, some may test only symptomatic players once a week. Letting the teams handle this is a terrible idea but what is new with NCAA? Supposedly teams are supposed to play with seven available players, but there is absolutely no way to verify if teams are following this. For all we know the best player on Wiscy tested positive and they called off the game over that while IU played last night and did not test a single player. I am not saying this happened and it may very well not of, but letting the teams handle this is beyond stupid. Much rather have leagues handle the testing and police whether a game is played like in pros so their is no conflict of interest. Some of these college games probably could probably of been played if the NCAA or conference handled and policed the testing but by the teams doing it I am sure there is a ton of abuse of the system.

Much better effort than Western Michigan against a better team. SIU is still bad, but has actually had some decent results this year (beat a bad Illinois team and played strong against a good Tennesee team) and IU made them look really atrocious with suffocating D. Good pertformance.

SIU is probably our best cupcake as they beat Illinois. With that said Illinois is horrible and also lost to SIUE and Middle Tennessee. Need a better effort than Sunday or this will come down to wire. Any other equivalent performance from a game this season would be a reasonably comfortable win.

IU would not schedule a game though. They would schedule another cupcake. People were complaining about IU's schedule not being tough enough. Then the Big Ten steps in and mandates 3 harder games (2 conference games, Gavitt) and everyone still complains. Do people just like to complain no matter what that either the schedule is to hard or to easy? That is what it seems like.

Wow he is not even a good cheater. He has been horrible at Nebraska and they are no better three years in (and maybe worse) than when he started. They are so far the worst team in the Big Ten since he got there. He brought in better players this year but cannot develop them which sounds familiar. Miles was not great but he was competitive, while Hoiberg has been terrible. Husker's version of Crean to Archie. To compare Miles had a (barely) winning record against IU. Hoiberg is 0-5 against us when we have not exactly been great either. Says all you need to know.

In this case yes. I guarantee you if Gavitt went away than Nov game would be replaced with Cupcake which you don't want.

In theory you are right, but if the Big Ten chops of a couple games and you did not have the Gavitt Games, a lot of teams would just schedule three cupcakes. Rather have 20 Big Ten games and Gavitt than the alternative.

Better St Johns than a directional Michigan or Illinois school which is what you would have in its place without the Gavitt Games. Anyone in Big East is better than the alternative.

Why? It gives you a good non-conference game instead of a cupcake. I like it a lot.

Agreed. I said atmosphere will be great, students or no students like Ohio State game over break in 2012. It just seems to put IU in a bad position of having to decide whether to: A. Leave it student package and hope enough of them stay back to go that you are not embarrassed with gobs of empty seats B. Re-sell all the tickets in the student section. This is probably the better of the two ideas and will let longtime Hoosier fans who do not usually get to go attend a marquee game. It does seem a shame though to deprive students of a marquee game but I think you have to based on the poor planning with the date.

One small problem. The game is scheduled to place AFTER finals at IU over break. Either you have to leave it in the student package and hope enough students stay back or you re-sell the game to everyone (sell-out and atmosphere won't be a problem with or without students) and deprive the students the marquee game of the year. Love the game but needed to be scheduled a week or two earlier. This date was not well thought through.

You forgot possible Gavitt Game.

This team is legit. Not sure anyone but Maryland has a chance to touch them in conference.

Well in terms of the Big Ten Minnesota is far better than anyone imagined and just knocked off Michigan. Nebraska and Penn State look like the only truly terrible teams, but some of the squads who were thought to be better are not so good (Michigan, Maryland, Rutgers). Looks like another year in Big Ten where anyone can beat anyone else and it will be really tight 1-12 minus the Cornhsukers and Nittany Lions.

Yup. If IU can just go 7-19 rather than 2-19 from three they have a really good chance.

Calipari had court rushed on him so can't come back to Notre Dame but it wasn't a buzzer beater:). Makes Irish a bit more challenging but also a better win if IU gets it. Need to avoid the 2-19 from three UK just pulled. That was main reason they lost.

We really need this game. There is only several chances for good Big Ten wins (Maryland x2, Iowa x2, @Ohio State, @Michigan). Basically we have a chance at a signature win only six times and this is one of them. The advantage is we should have little trouble finishing in the top 5 of conference minimum and getting an easy bid to NCAA Tournament. The bad news is with the bottom half of the Big Ten so beyond awful we are going to need to get a lot of wins in conference and 2-3 good ones against the above to get the top 4 seed and host. Everything I have seen so far makes me strongly believe IU is a conference title contender, but we need a few good wins (and this is one of the few chances left) and a lot of conference wins to get where we want to go..

In South Bend. Calipari is a hypocrite clearly.

Fine, but don't complain when IU gets a 5 or 6 seed rather than a 4 and does not get to host NCAA Tournament games because that UK win is no longer signature and we don't have enough good wins in Big Ten. If UK being bad is more important to you than hosting games in Assembly Hall that is fine with me. Just be aware that if UK falters as you want, it is probably the difference between hosting and not hosting, especially with how horrible the Big Ten is outside top five or six teams and only a few signature wins available in conference. Look if IU is 17-3 and wins the Big Ten it will make no difference but that is asking a lot. More likely you are something more like 12-6 or 13-5 and second or third in conference. In that case UK being a really good team as everyone thought this year and mediocre is probably the difference between a four and five seed and hosting. You are more than welcome to root for whoever you want. I just want to make sure you and everyone else are aware of the stakes of rooting against UK and them not being as good as thought.

Yup. Just like Maryland has no excuse for their poor play right now with Diamond Miller out. One of their best players, but they have five others who are just as good.

Now that's an upset I like. UK getting beat is not good for IU despite Hoosier fans instinct to root against Wildcats.

That is NOT a plus. UK is IU's signature win so far, so you need Wildcats to do well to help IU's NCAA Tournament seeding. Big Ten is horrible outside top 6, so not a ton more chances for quality wins and UK will be IU's only big nonconference win. As painful as it is IU needs UK to have a good year to have a better chance at that top 4 seed and hosting in NCAA Tournament games. Granted DePaul is really solid on women's side but so far UK has beat seven cupcakes but looked like garbage against the two good teams they have played in Hoosiers and Blue Demons. Need UK to pick it up and have a good season so our win against them continues to be strong.

No matter how she plays as someone with connections to Israel I love this:). Looks like her sister has done very well at Villanova.