Aaron

Some do some don't. We didn't have GA when I was in school so that helps which helps with getting people there early. I went to every game as a student but not many did and I know other students currently who use them sporadically. The very top of the GA balcony above you had a few empties at the back but was pretty full. Also the opposite west balcony which is not GA had a good amount of empty seats and above you in row 25 and above which is not GA had scattered empties behind you. As I said I don't blame the students. I blame the administration for the way tickets are distributed to maximize revenue and the incredibly mediocre play last few years. If the administration cut student tickets (or won more) and really rewarded people like you who actually show up you would not have empty seats like you do now. Also outside of big games there are a lot more empty seats and the balconies can be nearly empty. I thank you as a student for your support and wish more would show up outside of big games and a change in how tickets distributed would help the mass amount of empty seats.

He said the MSU crowd was loud and into the game but their were empty seats in the student section (it was less than usual but still some empty). All of that is correct. As I said blame IU for how they distribute tickets for the empty seats.

Well clearly PU is unbeatable at home but fortunately they are terrible away from Mackey which is where we play them Saturday. Also shows Iowa is not this unbeatable force as people seem to think. Need to win both games this week.

That's for sure. For full disclosure I know Doyle a little bit, which is why I defend him, but trust me when I say he really wants local teams to succeed and is just saying the truth which sometimes hurts for fans to hear which I get. Blame the administration for reasons I stated, not Doyle for saying something that is factually correct but hard to hear.

I know this is a huge absolute, but I truly believe Archie's ability to possibly have a successful tenure here rests on this game. Win it and you probably get just enough home games moving forward to make tourney and build some moment next year and in future. Lose and I think another long slide starts and it leads to the beginning of the end of his tenure here whether it is at the end of this year or next. Much like the Michigan game in Crean's last year was the beginning of his end and really turned everyone including the media on him, a no-show I think turns everyone against Archie once and for all. He has not beaten PU before and this is an incredible mediocre Boilermaker team that you MUST beat at home if you want to be the coach here beyond this year or next.

I hate to day it but its not wrong. Outside of big games the crowds have been weak. A big part of it though is the way IU distributed student tickets combined with mediocre play. If you want to blame someone, blame the administration for only caring about revenue and the tickets sold rather then making sure butts are in seats and students are notoriously flaky. Also letting our basketball program get to this level is a huge part, which is also on the administration. Their is a good argument to be made for taking some tickets away from students, but don't blame Doyel for stating the truth that the atmosphere has lacked last few years (outside of big games) which is 100 percent true.

I agree with that which is right at year or 4 or 5 which is what I said. His contract runs seven years though and he is not making to the end of that as you said without a tournament appearance at some point in that time frame. I hope Archie succeeds as well and he makes it to end of contract but that is not guarantee as you stated before unless he picks it up in next year or 2.

You hope Archie makes it to the end of his contract but there is zero chance he gets seven years if he does not make tournament before that. Most he gets is 4 or 5 if he still has not made tourney by then.

We're close and probably first or second five seed and tonight's win goes a long way. That NW loss continues to be a killer though that could cost team Big Ten title and top 4 seed if it comes down to those two, unless we beat them in Big Ten Tournament.

We're close and probably first or second five seed and tonight's win goes a long way. That NW loss continues to be a killer though that could cost team Big Ten title and top 4 seed if it comes down to those two, unless we beat them in Big Ten Tournament.

We might be after tonight or at least very close. We were certainly on the 5 line (17-20) before tonight and this win helps a lot. That NW loss though could be the difference between a Big Ten title and a top 4 seed in tourney though and I knew it at the time. A win over Maryland Thursday would be wonders towards getting us there.

Thats the team we saw early in the year. Took control early and other then a PU run late in the third quarter which we responded to, got a really important road win against a tournament team for the second time in conference play. If the team from earlier in the year that showed up tonight really is back, the sky is once again the limit. Have one more really tough game against Maryland at home on Thursday, then a fairly tough road game against a Nebraska team who is similar to PU. After that the schedule really lightens up to close the season with a road game at Illinois who is worse team in the Big Ten by far, then a home game against a mediocre Ohio St. team, a road game against a bad Minnesota team, senior day against Nebraska which should be a win at home before closing it out at a decent but not great Michigan team. If the team that showed up tonight really is back and we can get one of the next two, baring a collapse we really shouldn't lose more than one down the stretch. This puts us in great position for at least a top four seed and double bye in Big Ten Tourney as well as a top 4 seed and home court in NCAA Tourney. I said after Wisconsin that either that win was a lesson and saved the season or it was a warning sign of a collapse. If tonight is any indication appears we took the former path which would be really good. PU is not what they once were (due to their refusal to get rid of Versyp who is a mediocre coach), but they are still solid and we have owned this series recently after never being able to beat them for a long time.

That first half was the best they have looked since early in the Iowa game against a quality opponent. Got off to a good start finally, played tough D in the post and Berger found her shot again. Now the trick is to bring this home and put ourselves back in contention in the Big Ten and for a top 4 tourney seed which this would do. Game is not over and we need another half like that but finally they were fun to watch again for first time in a few games and played well.

Winning this both games this week is big if and 1-1 would be an accomplishment but two wins does put us back on track. Hopefully that Wisconsin game was a lesson. If they play like that against anyone else but Illinois they won't win.

Berger is only a sophomore and graduates in 2022. Otherwise agree with your sentiment.

After giving a game away against a really good Northwestern a couple weeks ago, IU flat out stole a win against a bad but improving Wisconsin team at home. We still should of won this game easier, but got away with one and in some ways given how games went, we now have a win we really don't deserve tonight in Wiscy and a game we deserved and gave away against Cats so that's kind of a wash now. If this wakes us up it could propel us back to where we need to get. Otherwise this may not end pretty given our tough schedule coming up starting with PU Monday. Slow starts are not ideal but tonight took it to a whole new level and nearly cost us our season in someways as I don't think we would of recovered enough from this. Team celebrated after and either this brings them together or makes them overconfident and this less then stellar play continues. Hope its the former.

Not since the Zeller era have we blown them out. Otherwise every game has indeed been close since but we have won six of those eight games including several on the road.

This match-up is so interesting in that we have owned PSU like no other Big Ten team since beginning of the Zeller Era (11 of 13 wins and only one loss in Bryce Jordan in that time). However, games have been close and this is a far better PSU team then any we have seen recently. Every once in a while PSU bubbles up for a year with a really good senior and they have done that now with Lamar Stevens, Mike Watkins and of course Curtis Jones. Don't think they can sustain this moving forward with only Myreon Jones and Myles Dread as the guards and no proven big men going forward, but for this year they are a handful and for once would represent a good win rather then avoiding a bad loss.

A little ugly but we closed out this time with no problem. Second of three straight against bottom feeders you cannot lose and so far we have controlled these games. Stretch after that will show how high the ceiling is with a lot of 50-50 games against mid-level teams. Still need to work on our starts but once we get it going we are unstoppable. Still afraid that NW game is going to cost us Big Ten Title but everything is still very much in play. Also attendance was 3,500 tonight which for a Monday night is amazing. Not to long ago that took a special promotion or a perfectly timed weekend game. Now it's a starting point with big crowds nearly doubling that. Keep winning and building the program.

That's because that was a break game with student section re-sold (8,000 tickets). Those have never sold out and growing up these were the games my family would go to. Look at the box scores from the Knight era and all are listed as sellouts of over 17K EXCEPT the break games which were 14-15k. Nothing has changed there in history of program. IU still has full 'sellouts' with students in session but the number of no-shows and the low price of the secondary market is a warning sign and always the first indication that people are ready to drop their season tickets soon and then it will hit IU in the pocket book. For this year revenue is not hurt at all but it will moving forward without a winning product. As I said this was warning sign for Colts in 2017 before 2018 and now they have 10,000 unsold seats a game from the team. IU is getting a warning sign and if it does not heed it the bottom line is about to take a hit money wise.

This is sort of related to Archie but IU better be real careful. As someone who dropped my season tickets and buy 4-5 individual games on stub-hub now I can tell you the secondary market is really soft and is a buyers market. While this does not directly affect IU right now, people will stop buying season tickets if they cannot get a return on the ones they cannot go to and can buy cheaper on secondary market (this is reason I dropped). The Colts had a huge waiting list that went away really fast and now have 10k empty seats a game as team has been inconsistent and a big part of that is brokers cannot make money on secondary market which is a good percentage of your season ticket holders. I think IU thinks they are invincible and people are so loyal and will keep buying season tickets but we are a year or two away from individual sales on primary market and official non-sellouts. This happened to Illinois a few years ago. IU is about to take a huge hit in the pocket book they don't even realize and by then it may be to late to act. Now I have not so much soured Archie, but if he does not make tournament this year or especially next you cannot tell fans to be patient anymore. IU will need to make a splash hire with instant success or their basketball revenue will finally go down a lot which they would deserve.

I hope the women didn't enjoy all this extra attention because they just lost it. Fair or not, Olympic sports if you want extra attention must remain highly ranked and a contender and now they are not (even our soccer team needs to be a contender to be in IU mainstream). Once postseason hits people will start paying attention again and you will still hear about them here or there. The problem is being mentioned on every Hoosier show and podcast in the mainstream is over for this year and they have entirely themselves to blame. Its not last night that's the problem as Maryland does this to everyone at home this year. The problem was the Northwestern loss they gave away will haunt them all season and may or may not be the catalyst that never achieves what they can be (yes it was that big possibly). When you are teetering for respectability and on the rise this is a game you cannot lose in that fashion and they did. They better get it back together now as they play the absolute bottom feeders in the conference for a while now but a top 4 seed and Big Ten Championship are kind of out of it now unless you go nearly undefeated down stretch which seems unlikely. This had a chance to be such a special season and is quickly fading to be similar to last two tourney teams (maybe slightly better). At some point though if you want to take a step to a constant tourney team and be among the top Big Ten teams and attract recruits after being awful for so long you have to have a really big season to say these losing ways are no more. IU baseball did this in 2012 and 2013 and that's why they have sustained it. So many IU sports have a couple nice seasons but most fall back unless they have that really big season to keep them going at a new level. The Women doing that is a must next year now or this could very well be a flash in the pan. Note we have no recruits for any future classes and if you want to add to the six 5* recruits you have on the team now and show this is not a fluke you need a huge season in next couple years or this is not sustainable. Hopefully they get it back together and don't throw away such a promising season and future. I have faith they won't but they need to show it.

Well have not seen us start a second half this strong all year. Now lets finish the job.

Here's the problem the women face whether fair or not: with football or men's basketball if you lose people will criticize you. In Olympic sports people will just forget about you really fast. I have seen it throughout the years with Olympic sports and it takes elite teams to get people excited (and its like this at every school to be clear) . The Women are getting attention like never before and have all of Hoosier Nation excited and paying attention for first time. With the main two sports if you start losing after showing promise people will criticize you but still pay attention. If the women start to struggle people will just forget the team is playing much like it has been for a while. I saw it with baseball a couple years ago where we were a legit top 10 team and everyone got really excited. We ended up falling off to just a mid-pack Big Ten tourney team but after losing top status the team got a lot less discussion within the Hoosier community second half of season. Same with soccer. Despite being really good for a long time until they returned to top status in 2017 after a decade of 'pretty good' people really didn't give them the same attention they do now or in Jerry Yeagley era. Softball experienced something similar last year as well with a huge undefeated start to season before falling off in Big Ten play and people just stopped paying attention by second half of season. This in my opinion is so important why when you start strong as the Women have this year you need to work twice as hard to make sure you finish the season as strong as you start it and not have episodes like last night. Even if we fall to a good team people will forget about them until tourney time. It has been great hearing them discussed this year like never before within Hoosier Nation but if they want that to continue and program to grow last night better never be repeated and they better play hard at Maryland since this is a BTN game (IU is lucky last night was BTN+ and not BTN or they would have gotten ten times the criticism) and then run off a bunch in a row against teams towards the bottom of the conference. Worst case scenario IU is a mid-pack tournament team again but that finish will not grow the program and continue the momentum they have built this year. Last nights crowd was another 'lower' one of just under 4,000 but that was a high crowd before this year. if you want 3,000 to be the starting point rather then a big crowd and continue to be discussed within the main stream of Hoosier Nation you need an elite season to really take off and you cannot blow this. Apathy is worse then criticism and it takes very little for women's program (or any Olympic sport) to go back to receiving apathy from large parts of Hoosier Nation. Its unfortunate but that is the word we live in.

IU's one chance to win title still is to go to Maryland and steal the next game much like men had to do in 2012-2013 after two bad home losses they made up with shocking wins at Michigan St. and Michigan. Women need same now or title hopes over. Maryland went from bonus game to must win now which I don't see happening.