Game Thread: UNC vs IU - November 30th @ 9:20 on ESPN

[cappymo14]

The fact that this is at home bodes well for Indiana. Team needs to bring a toughness like we haven't seen since KU. Ultimately, I think UNC takes this one, in a back and fourth affair. With Kansas, I felt we had an advantage on the glass. UNC doesn't give me the same vibe, so that's where the work needs to be. If we can match, or better them on the boards, we can be right there at the end, and who knows. UNC is unlikely to be flustered by a switch to zone defense so pick n roll, dribble drive, defense is all important. Double team Hicks. Now that doesn't mean leave corner shooters wide open to go help. Just have to play smarter than we have thus far. Can not, CAN NOT, waste time with that dribble handoff stuff that goes nowhere or the ok stand there with the ball until shot clock is at 7 then punt. Every possession has to have ball movement with a purpose. Not just swinging for swinging's sake. Should be very interesting. Let's go IU. Forget the negativity, forget the expectations. Forget your ranking and play your game.


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[rebelhoosier848891]

A rocking Assembly Hall (or whatever they call it now) is still worth about 10 points---all other things being even. If Blackmon is healthy--I like our chances. Go Hoosiers!

[Class of '66 Old Fart]

’81 National Champions To Reunite And Be Honored Wednesday Night

BLOOMINGTON, Indiana - Members of the 1981 NCAA Men's Basketball Championship team will hold a reunion this Wednesday night and will be honored at halftime of Wednesday night's game which features the Hoosiers hosting North Carolina in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge.  The game tips off at 9:15 p.m. in Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall.
 
The group captured the second of Coach Bob Knight's three NCAA titles with a 63-50 victory over UNC on March 30, 1981.  The team finished 26-9 and won the Big Ten title with a 14-4 record.
 
The team finished non-conference play with a 7-5 record and then closed the Big Ten season winning seven of its last eight.  In the NCAA Tournament, the Hoosiers beat Maryland, 99-64; UAB. 97-72; St. Joseph's, 78-46; LSU, 67-49 and then the Tar Heels in the title game.
 

	1981 Indiana Roster
11	Isiah Thomas	SO
20	Jim Thomas	SO
23	Chuck Franz	SO
24	Randy Wittman	SO
30	Ted Kitchel	SO
31	Tony Brown	SO
32	Landon Turner	JR
33	Eric Kirchner	SR
34	Steve Risley	SR
40	Glen Grunwald	SR
43	Mike LaFave	FR
44	Phil Isenbarger	SR
45	Ray Tolbert	SR
54	Steve Bouchie	SO

 

Head Coach:  Bob Knight

Assistant Coaches:  Jim Crews, Jene Davis,  Gerry Gimelstob 
Trainer:  Bob Young
 
Ray Tolbert and Glen Grunwald were team captains.  Ray Tolbert was named Big Ten Player of the Year and Isiah Thomas was named the NCAA Tournament's Most Outstanding Player.  Coach Knight was named Big Ten Coach of the Year.
 
Coach Knight, Landon Turner, Ray Tolbert, Ted Kitchel, Randy Wittman and Isiah Thomas are all inducted in the IU Athletics Hall of Fame.
 

[ALASKA HOOSIER]

Iam so excited to see some of these studs again. Landon Turner getting honored is HUGE!

[HoosierAloha]

That's insane looking at the scores. Average margin of victory... ~25 points

[Baltimore Hoosier]

Indiana needs to run and hope this doesn't turn into a half court game, which shouldn't be a problem based on what I've seen of UNC so far. IU can certainly shoot, but they also have to look for good shots and not launch too many contested 3's. I also REALLY hate seeing Bryant outside the 3-point line lobbing up 3's and giving up uncontested defensive rebounds.

I mentioned turnovers and easy shots in the game thread vs IPFW and my statement remains the same. IU cannot hope to beat good teams when they turn the ball over carelessly and give up easy buckets because they are lazy on rotations and leaving shooters wide open.

I've got IU in a tight one 87 - 85. Although a beatdown like the one we put on UNC in 2012 would also be nice.

[FortWayneHoosier]

Ouch


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[WayneFleekHoosier]

If you listened to Roy Williams press conference you'd feel even worse about our chances.

Talked so clearly about strengths and what needs to happen to defend. Talked about having different sets for each big based on skillsets. Talked about Berry being able to contain dribble penetration and that being the key to the defense functioning as a whole. Need less help, etc. He's a cheating bastard but he knows basketball.

That said, we find a way, I hope. Even though I can't really find an advantage we have over them except home court.




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[kaylarened]

Does anybody have any tickets for sale to this game? Just needing one.


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[reconmkd]

I saw last night that it looks like Blackman is a go for this game. I really hope this little injury scare lights a fire under his feet on the defensive side of the ball and hope at least he guards a chair tonight.

[coonhounds]

I don't see anything positive happening for him on defense due to this injury. Maybe the loss to ipfw will cause him to realize he needs to try on defense but doubtful

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[HoosierRob]

Blackmon is never going to be a good defensive player. I just hope the kid can stay healthy. I don't think he can.

[reconmkd]

I was being a little sarcastic on the defensive hopes, but I really do hope that he shows up for this game and maybe guard a chair. We could really use the 20 PPG and have another option to spread the defense. Got to hit shots early, cause No Classes already seems to have a game plan to stop us.

[yogisballin]

Ouch


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That 39% chance will be on the energy of the crowd. If they anything like myself about this team, that number goes way down


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[WayneFleekHoosier]

Blackmon is never going to be a good defensive player. I just hope the kid can stay healthy. I don't think he can.

This is the concern. It is really sad. Even if healthy doubt has crept into his mind by now. It's tragic, because my feeling is if injuries never happened, I really think he's an NBA player, at least as a shooter.


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[Class of '66 Old Fart]

This is must reading.  A really great piece from Jeff LaFave whose father was a member of the '81 squad.

Column: A walk in my father’s size-17 shoes

Indiana’s 1980-81 men’s basketball championship team was studded with legendary players.

My father, a backup freshman forward, was not necessarily one of them.

Take a look at Mike LaFave’s single-season resume, and the bashful man I called “Dad” would undoubtedly agree: 11 points across 15 games played — during a whopping 33 minutes of total court time — is nothing special by Indiana standards.

Heck, it’s almost nothing at all.

Nevertheless, the experience of playing Big Ten basketball for two seasons, as well as reporting to coach Bobby Knight, brought him one shiny championship ring and a lifetime of memories.

And when his peers take the court tonight at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall to cherish their victory over North Carolina in the 1981 NCAA Championship game, I will be awash with pride for the intangible lessons my father passed on to me and my family — each moral chapter coming from his experiences on and off the court for Indiana.

Mike LaFave’s narrative is one of constant support for his team: Watch the NBC broadcast of IU’s 1981 title game, and you’ll see why the gaunt 6-foot-9 geek with mop-top hair was nicknamed “IU’s tallest cheerleader,” visibly leaping on the sideline after every Hoosier basket.

Because hey — if your career-best game for IU involved a mere five rebounds, you may as well stomp and yell where you can.

My father spoke more to me of appearing at the bedside of teammate Landon Turner, who suffered paralysis in a July 1981 roll-over car accident, and the importance of being a devoted friend first, than any athletic glory or sports conquest. Those latter things are secondary.

He waxed poetic about the life experiences a scoreboard could never detail: Practicing twice on Christmas Day. Running drills up the stairs of Assembly Hall for each point the Hoosiers lost by. Signing autographs for countless children, many of whom did not know his name. The woes of contracting a stomach virus just hours after losing to Pan-American during an unfathomably grisly exhibition showing in Hawaii.

My father recorded more turnovers during IU’s championship season (2) than blocks (1), but I’d dare anyone to tell me he didn’t embrace life as a Hoosier.

During the entire NCAA postseason, he recorded one field goal and one personal foul. He didn’t even see the court in IU’s championship game against North Carolina. But that certainly didn’t stop him from reveling in the victory.

Postgame, the freshman quipped to reporters that he was undefeated in national championships, and thus better than teammate and friend Ray Tolbert, who took four seasons to reach that apex.

Formally, Mike LaFave’s days at Indiana concluded when he opted to play his junior and senior seasons at Ball State with fellow IU departee Rick Rowray. A Louisville Courier-Journal article from Dec. 28, 1983, indicated that Dad’s playing opportunities under coach Knight were “slim,” hence his transfer to the Cardinals.

Lo and behold, his time in Muncie wasn’t a legendary one either, as he averaged 4.6 points per game. He has one entry in the Ball State record book: averaging 0.9 blocked shots per game across 23 contests in 1983-84, which ties him for 26th best in the program all-time.

That’s not to say Mike LaFave was a pedestrian player. He was an Indiana All-Star at Scecina Memorial, where he amassed virtually every scoring record to that point. An Indianapolis Star article from 1979 praised his “quick foot forward” for the Crusaders, and his jersey still hangs in Scecina’s halls. He was inducted as part of the IHSAA’s Silver Anniversary team in 2005. And being a participant of the United States’ fifth-place finish in the 1979 “Sparkatiade” games played against the Soviet Union merited him an official biography spot on USA Basketball’s roster webpage.

(The alphabetical format places him immediately after Christian Laettner.)

His last memory of Indiana basketball was one we shared together, when current IU head coach Tom Crean invited my family to his inaugural Hoosier Hysteria in 2008, commencing a 6-26 rebuilding season that most Hoosier fans would prefer not to speak about.

It was my father’s first time in Assembly Hall since 1982.

Picture, if you will, a gangly 18-year-old and his mustachioed father, humbly eating pork brisket as an enthusiastic basketball coach from Marquette made the rounds between tables of special guests before the evening’s tip. There was a sense of pride in what my father had done — even if that resume only included 11 points some three decades ago for a program that had just been shackled by NCAA disciplinary sanctions.
My father, normally a terse and dry-humored man, said he joked with Crean in private: “I can put on a jersey again, if that helps.”

He left Bloomington with a beaming smile, some closure in his pocket that what he had done was not forgotten or unappreciated. Students greeted him outside the hall en route to his truck. Together, we pledged to watch the new-look Hoosiers play together and hoped Crean could revive the program.

It would be Dad’s last time in Bloomington. He died just three months later.

A sudden heart attack claimed him at age 46, leaving behind his most cherished teammates: wife Sherry, daughter Tara, youngest son Joe, and yours truly.

There’s not a lot I can mention in this column that isn’t a fuzzy-at-best childhood memory with the big man, or a final conversation blurred by the passage of time.

But what I absorbed from my father’s basketball career — a constantly shuffled, bench-riding four years met with missed expectations and a bittersweet championship run — is that sports don’t matter.

People do.

What matters most is how you treat those around you, the mettle with which you approach a daunting situation and how you act in the face of adversity. His two years at IU instilled that in him. Character is what matters most, and no championship ring was built to contain that legacy.

Tonight, his former teammates — some of which will go down as legendary NBA players and coaches — will take Branch McCracken court to revisit their historic victory over UNC more than 35 years later. My father won’t be there to join some of those he called his very best friends.
But I will be there in a way my that suits my father’s legacy — jumping up and down, clapping my hands, and offering support from the sideline.

Jeff LaFave is a copy editor and page designer for the Herald-Times.

[LockdownD]

Excellent article, 66.  Thank you for sharing.  I'm so looking forward to experiencing "Hoosier Nation" tonight.  

[Class of '66 Old Fart]

Another great article from the NY Times.   PICKING UP THE PIECES AT INDIANA U.

http://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/23/sports/picking-up-the-pieces-at-indiana-u.html?pagewanted=all

[hsrtxp]

Wow. Not many words to describe the feelings that evoked.


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[OliviaPope40]

Which Blackmon is going to show up it is going to be the Blackmon that played well against Kansas or is it going to the Blackmon that didn't play so well against Fort Wayne? I honestly don't know a whole lot about this year's UNC team but I think it will be a good game and we are really going to need the student section to be on it.