SamIam

Well, here we are. Back with my thoughts after watching/rewatching some of it. Feel free to let me know what you think. Overall, I'm worried. I knew this team had serious issues with roster construction. I still expected them to be elite defensively. The changes made to the defensive system are actively harming the team. This is largely a system issue. All offensive systems are designed to flex a defense, force rotation, and eventually to expose the defense when it fails to bend to the offense. IU's defense is bending out of position and scrambling to catch up off of no action. Over helping on drives/screens/normal offensive action is KILLING us. No reason for another defender to come halfheartedly hedge when the on-ball defender is over the screen, and with how many 3's we've given up, it would be better to stay with our man on the perimeter and trust that we have a 7 foot monster at the rim. Right now, we give up a million open looks and if we do that against a real team we will get run out of the gym. There is no reason to do this the vast majority of the time and it needs to be fixed. The obvious roster construction issues with this team are killing us. I like Woodson, but the worst thing about him is how stubborn he is. Like when he is asked about shooting more threes and his answer is "we are going to post the ball." Reneau cannot play the 4. Woody has to learn that or we are capped offensively and defensively. He seems to want to get the best 5 individual players out on the court, but he needs to get the best team out on the court. MR is certainly one of the best 5 players, but our best team does not have him at the 4. Let MR and Ware play some minutes together each game, but only with the three guard lineup. Beyond that, they need to stagger minutes at the 5. Along those lines, it's clear that Mgbako is a 4 not a 3. People are calling him lazy, and he has certainly gotten lost a couple of times on D, but one of the other things I see is him lagging off for fear that he will be beat on the drive. He's faster than 4s and he's big enough to play it. Let him run next to Ware I guarantee the offense is immediately better. The sooner Woodson realizes this, the better. We need MM on the court for this team to have basically any offensive upside. MR would also be better if he got to play in a lineup with ANY spacing. Dude is fighting doubles all the time. Like I said after last game, Banks needs to play. Sure, he makes some mistakes, but he seems to be penalized more than a lot of the other guys who do (Gunn, Reneau). He's long, fast, pursues rebounds relentlessly, and is making perimeter shots this year. He needs to be in at the 3 for some stretches, preferably alongside Mgbako. If we want to be good this season the lineup that provides the most upside is X Gallo Banks Mgbako and Ware. Playing without two bigs would also help us get out and run. We are currently playing at a sub-300 tempo right now. For a team that has no discernible offensive sets, this is really inexplicable. They need to push the pace. I just don't think the team can handle having Reneau's lack of speed on the floor with Ware. Ware played well but I am worried about how easily he got pushed around. Needs to get low. Reneau played poorly, he looked overwhelmed. We should expect that because he's playing with no spacing. His chicken wing remains obvious and will cost us at some point. X played well. He is one of the guys who is hurt most by the current roster construction. He is a great downhill guard, if we were able to surround him with a pick and pop big and a couple shooters he would be so much better. Right now he gets downhill only to run into our own guys. I think he is often misunderstood on the court, I love that he plays with emotion, but I think his body language/ calling teammates out only works if you have the respect of the team like TJD did. I really hope thats the case. Lastly, it's time to see Leal. Leal has his limitations. But Gunn is bad. His mechanics are all out of wack. When you watch him warm up, he's shooting normally. But the second he gets in the game, he gets too excited and jumps to the moon. When he is in the game the ball stops on him, and all movement with it. One of the issues with Woodson is that he doesn't understand that some players play based on rhythm. Geronimo was like this, he played well when he was allowed to play through mistakes and he got into the flow, and he was a non-factor late in the season when he knew one mistake would get him pulled. I could see Gunn being like this. But right now we are struggling to put away sub-300 Kenpom teams. These should be the confidence building games. We need to be blowing these teams out before we can worry about getting young guys confidence minutes. Leal helps us win now more than Gunn because he moves the ball in the offense better than anyone on the team, and there is simply no way Gunn is a better shooter than him right now. It quite literally only gets harder from here. Army is the only sub-300 Kenpom team on the schedule. This was supposed to be the tune-up game, and they took us to the wire in our own gym. Army lost by 13 to Stonehill. Stonehill lost by 40(!!!) to UConn. Two games in a row, Woodson has had to roll with the three guard lineup just to win the game. It's hard for this team to learn, for the bench to round into form if we are forced to play that lineup just to save us from an L.

IU 83 West Point 63

Alright, completed my rewatch and I have a good amount of notes. Feel free to let me know what ya think! I have no idea why Banks didn't play more. I don't think it was a minutes restriction, cause Woody called him out postgame. He only played 2 mins, and was where he was supposed to be on defense. When FGCU scored while Banks was in, it was Walker who was out of position, but Walker played 13 mins. I will say this till I am blue in the face but he needs to play. If we are committed to these defensive changes this year, he is the player that most fits. On offense, he wasn't really in the swing of things but he played 2 mins so thats to be expected. Speaking of Walker, a lot of people wondered why Woody went after him, and those people were vindicated last night. Terrible game from him on both sides. Obviously it's one game, but it is very glaring on tape. Not giving up on him, but we need to see more of what we saw in the exhibitions. Reneau has a VERY obvious chicken wing that will get called eventually, but his right hand is improved. He also has a bit of a jab step he uses that is basically 50-50 on whether it will be called a travel. Looks like this team is going to switch basically everything on the weak side, and in general they are being told to switch 1-4. This, to me, is the major difference defensively from last year. There is also a lot of weak side help from the high PnR which got us caught out on so many threes. Its designed to trap a ball handler and force a risky pass which would be ill-advised against our length. This defense takes a ton of communication and athleticism. I believe we have the guys to play it, and it would definitely help getting us in transition. The problem right now is the wings don't know how to play it. Walker, Gunn were out of position a ton, Reneau knows where he is supposed to be but definitely got caught over-helping and just didn't have the speed. This should improve but Gunn looked like he didn't know what he was doing, and Walker was way overcompensating trying to be everyone's help. Mgbako just got lost ball-watching. Not sure what to make of that. One of the things you notice when Cupps is in the game in the three guard set is that they switch way less. It's a combo of Gabe being tenacious at sensing/getting through screens, and I think the team has been told not to switch all the time with him because it could create a real size mismatch. Once the team got back to what they were comfortable with the defense picked up. Beyond that, Cupps just has a feel for where hes supposed to be on both sides, and I've been SUPER impressed with his lateral quickness. On offense there was always a wing open off the PnR. The rolling big in the high post needs to make that pass, and the wing needs to knock it down. Woodson clearly still prefers an open long two to a closeout three, they all fake and step into long 2s. Gunn might not be paying attention to the defensive lessons but he definitely listened to that one. Dude jumps as high as he can on every three, someone needs to tell him a half-hearted closeout presents no danger to his jumper, just let the 3 fly. We've all been saying this forever but this team needs to play small at times. Its hard because Reneau is our best scorer right now, and he probably isn't a solution at the 5 due to lack of rim protection, but we need to see a lineup of Ware, Mgbako, Banks, Gallo, and X. What we lose in offense will be picked up by Mgbako actually being able to expose slower 4s and X and Gallo having space to get downhill. Reneau would be better served in that lineup (at the 5) too. Just like TJD, he is drop stepping right into Ware's defender because Woodson insists on leaving the 4 in the dunker position on the other block. Lastly, that lineup has the speed and length at the 3 and 4 to get in passing lanes on the back end and play the defense Woodson wants this year. Overall, they still played well defensively despite a ton of glaring miscommunications. I expect this to improve over the season and I think IU will be an elite defensive team. Offensively, this is the same old IU team. To maximize X, Gallo, Mgbako, and Ware there needs to be proper spacing. Until Woody is willing to sacrifice some minutes with 2 bigs, we will continue to see a disjointed and ugly offense that emphasizes posting up with 2 bigs, and faking the three to step into a long 2. We had a top 50 offense doing that last year, but there just isn't as much upside with it.

IU 74 FGCU 63

Is this confirmation that Dolson is looking into it? Do we think we will be able to come up with the 5 million over 4 years in a way that wont hamper NIL, other athletics, IUBB, AND leave enough leftover to hire an actually competent coach??

If we are out on the Knecht staff needs to get Cormac Ryan on campus ASAP

All fair. I thought MR really improved in terms of moving his feet and not fouling as the season went on so I am confident in him playing heavy minutes. As for Banks and Gunn its hard to project their PT hopefully we get another transfer that takes the bulk of those minutes.

We may be out on Knecht but it looks like we are still in a good spot for Ledlum. I'm really interested in the rotation next year and I'm bored right now so I am going to try and guess at the rotation. Feel free to roast my thoughts here. Ledlum is a 3/4 and I think he could probably shoot around 35% in our offense since our players tend to get open 3s. But his best skill is being long and athletic enough to play a small four and attack closeouts of smaller, less athletic 4's. Hopefully we get another wing to reduce the minutes he sees at the 3. I see our big rotation of MR, Ledlum, Ware, and Sparks with MR splitting time between 4/5, Ware playing less minutes than we expect due to general fatigue and foul trouble, Ledlum sliding down to the 4 for lineups with MR and Ware at the 5, and Sparks playing spot minutes at the five (he's too slow to play the 4 but energy minutes at the five is perfect for him). X and Gallo will start. We've had a lot of discussions on Gallo but every year he gets himself on the floor because he makes it hard for the coaches not to play him. Watching some of our games back this year I've realized how many of Gallo's defensive lapses were due to him trying to help off his man to help JHS contain the ball handler. I think with X back those lapses more or less disappear and thats one of the best defensive backcourts in the B1G. People talk a lot about the work he put in to be a good shooter but we have to remember that he had surgery in the offseason and he still improved his 3PT% from 21 to 46(!!!)%. I'm excited to see what he can do with a full offseason to work. So that leaves the rotation as follows (with their minutes in parenthesis): PG: X (32), Cupps (8) SG: Gallo (28), Gunn (6), Leal/Newton (6) SF: Ledlum (15), Gunn (15), Banks (10) PF: MR (25), Ledlum (13), Banks (2) C: Ware (28), MR (7), Sparks (5) The shooting of this lineup worries me. Would love to nab a shooter at the three and bump Ledlum into being a sixth man, which is a role I think he would be best in.

I feel like this is the main predictor of improvement. You gotta have guys who live the game. Last offseason we heard a lot about JHS living in the gym and Kopp seems like that guy, is there anyone else who the staff has talked about as a great worker?

Wasn't there a rumor about Essegian a while ago? Should I be rooting against Wisco tonight to speed that process up?

Hearing UVA fans say they think Armaan will get in the portal. Boomerang back to IU?

Ball State board seems to think Sparks' main goal is to play power 5, they think he is fine with a backup role. You gotta think IU would be one of the more attractive schools too since he would be working against a sophomore getting major minutes for the first time in his career in Reneau as opposed to a school with an established big where he could be buried. My big worry is that he has a similar body to Ike, he's a bruiser and we need an athletic shot blocker.

Lottich out at Valpo. Surprised they had the $$$ for the buyout considering their recent struggles with money. Would love to see Tonagel get a shot, or a Bryce Drew return. Feels like there should always be a Drew coaching at Valpo.

Thats a fair point but I do think we underestimate how much easier it is for a football school to spend. They might not even need to go to the booster money. They have a top 5 apparel contract, their own TV contract, and they already outspend Purdue on basketball.

While I will always root for Indiana teams, Shrews to ND could be bad for us. First, ND has serious cash. I'm not sure we could outbid them if it came to that. Second, while he wouldn't be in the B1G anymore, he will be in direct competition with us in recruiting. There are very few people on the planet as well connected in this state as Shrews. He recruits La Lu very well already and if he goes to ND he will be right down the street. I obviously don't want him at PSU but its easier for IU if ND sucks haha