str8baller

Good lord Rutgers played a tough 7 game stretch there. Let’s hope they’re on the down swing. I have a feeling this game will be tough though.

For sure. I just don’t think all the concern in the world is going to change who we are at this point. Maybe I’m wrong about that…who knows. But I fully expect this season to end with us playing crappy, mainly from the perimeter, in a tight game. At this point I’m content to see us navigate our obvious flaws to pick up needed wins. The 5 game Feb losing streak was brutal for everyone.

Good stuff for a rotation guy. He has the tools to be special. His aggressiveness will have to grow with his skill set. Let’s hope he’s more Victor Oladipo than Andre Patterson in that regard. His jumper looks really good too, imo. Lots to work with there.

Agreed. If Minny came out hot and IU roared back to a 5pt win the mood on here for some would be completely different. It’s no secret we can’t close games. We have awful guard play and can’t hit FT’s, so we’ll never close games well until that improves. I’m with you and choose to give a little credit to the staff for a good gameplan and the team for coming out ready to compete on the road in a big spot. Btw, Wisconsin has the best guard in the B1G and another senior guard who hits FT’s and doesn’t turn the ball over, and they are the best team in country in close games. I think they are closing in on a historic rating in Kenpoms “luck” rating (which is really just a measure of how well you do in close games and deviate from his predictor rating). I dream of the day IU returns to smart basketball and great guard play, but for now we have the team that we have. At this point I don’t see much changing. *If* we get into the tourney, our matchups, more than anything else, will decide if we have a chance to steal a game or two.

Don’t care. We’d all have been happy with a one point win earlier in the day. We stink at closing games out, but that’s why you get up big in the first place., Good road win. Knight teams went up there and lost. We’re knocking on the door of the tourney. Let’s go baby!!!!

Nothing. Same as when they missed them earlier

Good job by XJ to go to the rack

Lol…minny got hot and we can’t close. Hopefully we still win but Kenpom won’t be happy

5min to go. A little sloppy. Let’s not sh!t the bed here.

Let’s hope they start that way. You won’t hear me complain after we’ve taken several teams hot nights and recorded a loss.

Dear divine entity of your choice, let XJ play his best basketball down the stretch. With superior guard play from 1 guy this team is near top 25 level. Without that we’re less than a tourney team.

I thought Maryland was “must win.” Mostly because it was home and they are not good. I think we need 1 between Minny and Rutgers. Then maybe another in the BTT. So let’s win this and remove most of the doubt about our tourney chances.

67-66. IU ekes it out and almost secures a spot in the tourney.

There’s where I’ve been at. Just to simplify things a little, 19 win teams in the B1G, especially those with a couple big wins, tend to get into the tourney.

I think we’ll need a superhuman effort from TJD to win at Minny. So maybe it will motivate him a little that he didn’t play that well today. Would love to see Geronimo have a break out game and we need the bench scoring. His jumper looks good.

Damn it, I can’t believe we dropped both UW games. Win one of those and we’re probably already in the tourney.

I find Bardo to be about the worst announcer we get. He shouldn’t be calling anyone dumb…

I’ve blocked a lot of those guys from my memory. But I’ll say that i think XJ can be better at times than Green, especially defensively.

Xavier Johnson is such a weird player. At his best he looks like one of the best pgs in the B1G. At his worst he doesn’t even look like he belongs in a major conf. It’s mostly mental too. I don’t remember a player with so many ups and downs

These guys are incapable of playing loose on offense and good defense. Whenever they get a little flow going their defense goes to crap

We do not look like a tournament team. Sadly.

Lol…what a awful five min

This is pretty much a must win, right? Our margin of error is almost down to nothing. Hard to see any realistic path to the tourney if we drop this one.

Yep. And if you generously assume we’re 75% to beat Maryland at home the odds of us winning all three are about 19%. Kenpom is going to have Rutgers seriously underrated compared to how they’ve played the last few weeks.

I agree. Works for some. We’re way too unskilled. We’d be better off with the stupid Crean/Calipari dribble drive and let XJ beat people off the dribble (the thought of which makes me puke). The problem there is it’s tough to play Race and TJD at the same time. Woody deserves some criticism but the more I think on it, the more I really dislike our personnel situation.