IU Basketball News and Notes

[HoosierCoop]

12 hours ago, LamarCheeks said:

BTW, Damon Bailey turned 54 today. 

Damn, I'm old! 

Same here.  I was a Senior when I went to that State Championship game.  Best high school game I've ever seen live.

[Stuhoo]

Field of 68 guesstimates from yesterday:

• Potential top ten in the country offense
• Buzzing on Dorn and Reed Bailey
• Big questions about Bailey's ability to defend the five
• 8/9 tournament game is center mass of predictions; 4-ish seed if they become pretty good defensively and a Fran McCaffery Iowa team if they don't
• Very fun team to watch

 

 

[WayneFleekHoosier]

1 hour ago, Stuhoo said:

Field of 68 guesstimates from yesterday:

• Potential top ten in the country offense
• Buzzing on Dorn and Reed Bailey
• Big questions about Bailey's ability to defend the five
• 8/9 tournament game is center mass of predictions; 4-ish seed if they become pretty good defensively and a Fran McCaffery Iowa team if they don't
• Very fun team to watch

 

 

Thats a good summary.  Nobody really knows.  Lots of belief in Devries but question the roster type stuff.  I've been the same way.  This addresses most of my thoughts.  I'd like to be better.  But if we make the tournament as an 8 seed in year one I'm ok with that.  

[HoosierHoopster]

2 hours ago, Stuhoo said:

Field of 68 guesstimates from yesterday:

• Potential top ten in the country offense
• Buzzing on Dorn and Reed Bailey
• Big questions about Bailey's ability to defend the five
• 8/9 tournament game is center mass of predictions; 4-ish seed if they become pretty good defensively and a Fran McCaffery Iowa team if they don't
• Very fun team to watch

 

 

I like it. Dorn is something of a wild card imo. 
From the Marion game, the defensive rotations, switches and extensions to perimeter looked pretty good. Marion isn’t good, but at one point it was something like 31-4. That was a result of energetic D. And the shooting was without our best shooter finding his touch. Wilkerson is going to light up teams. 
it is absolutely going to be fun to watch, and based on the effort and communication I saw I expect our D to improve and adjust during the season. Imagine that, actual adjustments. So looking forward to watching this team grow

[Stuhoo]

14 minutes ago, HoosierHoopster said:

I like it. Dorn is something of a wild card imo. 
From the Marion game, the defensive rotations, switches and extensions to perimeter looked pretty good. Marion isn’t good, but at one point it was something like 31-4. That was a result of energetic D. And the shooting was without our best shooter finding his touch. Wilkerson is going to light up teams. 
it is absolutely going to be fun to watch, and based on the effort and communication I saw I expect our D to improve and adjust during the season. Imagine that, actual adjustments. So looking forward to watching this team grow

To give you an idea of just how dominant IU was against Marian, which is a pretty good NAIA team with a few former D1 players? 

• At one point, IU was ahead 42-5.
• The Boston Celtics coaching staff, which includes multiple recent NBA and high-major players (DaSean Butler, Mazzulla, Emile Jefferson, God Shammgod) just played a Mazzulla-dictated game against the Celtics media contingent, and the score was a similar 57-4. Per this article, "The game served as an (unneeded) reminder of the ridiculous disparity between (us) regular people and elite athletes."  IU did pretty much the same thing to an above-average NAIA college team.     

https://www.celticsblog.com/articles/122754/joe-mazzulla-celtics-coaches-media-game-53-points

 

[Pagoda]

18 minutes ago, Stuhoo said:

To give you an idea of just how dominant IU was against Marian, which is a pretty good NAIA team with a few former D1 players? 

• At one point, IU was ahead 42-5.
• The Boston Celtics coaching staff, which includes multiple recent NBA and high-major players (DaSean Butler, Mazzulla, Emile Jefferson, God Shammgod) just played a Mazzulla-dictated game against the Celtics media contingent, and the score was a similar 57-4. Per this article, "The game served as an (unneeded) reminder of the ridiculous disparity between (us) regular people and elite athletes."  IU did pretty much the same thing to an above-average NAIA college team.     

https://www.celticsblog.com/articles/122754/joe-mazzulla-celtics-coaches-media-game-53-points

 

 

[WayneFleekHoosier]

Are floating heads posters available this season?

[AZ Hoosier]

46 minutes ago, WayneFleekHoosier said:

Are floating heads posters available this season?

They should be out shortly, but are not out yet.

[Home Jersey]

9 hours ago, WayneFleekHoosier said:

Thats a good summary.  Nobody really knows.  Lots of belief in Devries but question the roster type stuff.  I've been the same way.  This addresses most of my thoughts.  I'd like to be better.  But if we make the tournament as an 8 seed in year one I'm ok with that.  

Yeah, fun listen. I liked the comparisons at the end. Purdue having a top offense and good defense as a 4 seed, UConn as an 8 seed with good offense and just good enough defense, Iowa missing the tournament as a good offensive team that couldn't get it figured out on defense. I feel like the 8 seed is the most likely scenario for us, which would put us on a similar trajectory to Louisville (in theory). 

I think / hope the team will shoot well enough to overcome challenges inside. 3 > 2 but live by the 3 die by the 3. I'm excited to see the players against real competition in Baylor. Long term I believe in DDV to make us relevant on the court again and Baylor ought to give us an idea of how far along this team is (or how far it still has to go). 

Gonna need guys like Bailey, Dorn and Alexis to step up in their roles... a lot hinges on it IMO. Not super concerned about that though because I think we're gonna see a team getting set up to succeed by their coach for the first time in a long while. 

[str8baller]

11 hours ago, Stuhoo said:

a Fran McCaffery Iowa team if they don't

If we’re 100+ ranked in Def-E I’ll have one foot out on the devries project.   Iowa probably averaged a def efficiency rank of 100th or worse. 
 

The was lots of consternation at the prospect of a Chris Collins hire. For reference, their worst year out of the last five or six years in defensive efficiency was 73rd. Every other year they were around 50 or better.  They do not have more talent than us generally.  
 

50th-ish in Def-E plus a top 25 Offense gets us to the tourney pretty easily.  A Fran-esque defense of 100th or worse (puke) in Def-E and we better be pushing a top 5 offense. 

[HoosierHoopster]

57 minutes ago, str8baller said:

If we’re 100+ ranked in Def-E I’ll have one foot out on the devries project.   Iowa probably averaged a def efficiency rank of 100th or worse. 
 

The was lots of consternation at the prospect of a Chris Collins hire. For reference, their worst year out of the last five or six years in defensive efficiency was 73rd. Every other year they were around 50 or better.  They do not have more talent than us generally.  
 

50th-ish in Def-E plus a top 25 Offense gets us to the tourney pretty easily.  A Fran-esque defense of 100th or worse (puke) in Def-E and we better be pushing a top 5 offense. 

Highly doubt we’re 100 plus defensive efficiency. DeVries needs to continue to improve the roster but they’re already showing defensive awareness, energy, switching, extension to perimeter and rotation. Aint going to be great out of the gate with current roster but the reason to expect continued growth is there

[Home Jersey]

16 minutes ago, HoosierHoopster said:

Highly doubt we’re 100 plus defensive efficiency. DeVries needs to continue to improve the roster but they’re already showing defensive awareness, energy, switching, extension to perimeter and rotation. Aint going to be great out of the gate with current roster but the reason to expect continued growth is there

Generally agree but don't think we can say they're already showing any of that yet (other than energy) based just on 2 games in PR in August we didn't actually see and one exhibition vs. NAIA Marian. 

I think we'll get a much better idea vs. Baylor if those things are up to snuff / on their way / need a lot more work to be decent

[HoosierHoopster]

26 minutes ago, Home Jersey said:

Generally agree but don't think we can say they're already showing any of that yet (other than energy) based just on 2 games in PR in August we didn't actually see and one exhibition vs. NAIA Marian. 

I think we'll get a much better idea vs. Baylor if those things are up to snuff / on their way / need a lot more work to be decent

I’m talking about the type of defensive movement we did see against Marion. It doesn’t matter if Marion stinks, it’s how they were playing D, the score was some reflection of that but not the point.

[str8baller]

10 hours ago, HoosierHoopster said:

Highly doubt we’re 100 plus defensive efficiency.

Same. But mainly because it should be an easy thing to do for any competent B1G coach. Generally speaking. 
 

It’s hard to take much from the exhibition other than that I think we’llhave to be sound fundamentally on defense because I don’t think we’ll swarm teams athletically. 

[Stuhoo]

13 minutes ago, str8baller said:

Same. But mainly because it should be an easy thing to do for any competent B1G coach. Generally speaking. 
 

It’s hard to take much from the exhibition other than that I think we’llhave to be sound fundamentally on defense because I don’t think we’ll swarm teams athletically. 

The thing that gives me some real hope that we'll be "good enough" defensively is that Devries is on the record as stating he likes what he currently sees defensively.

If (and this is the major 'if') we now have a coach that doesn't 'coach speak' much, that is good to hear. Especially in light of Devries' track record of having good defensive squads.

[Artie86]

5 hours ago, Stuhoo said:

The thing that gives me some real hope that we'll be "good enough" defensively is that Devries is on the record as stating he likes what he currently sees defensively.

If (and this is the major 'if') we now have a coach that doesn't 'coach speak' much, that is good to hear. Especially in light of Devries' track record of having good defensive squads.

....does anybody else get the sneeky feeling that Coach DeVries and the players he brought in are going to suprise a lot of people in a positive way? I sort of get the feeling of "under the radar" and "sleeper". It definitely happened with IU Football. NO ONE gave Coach Cignetti and IU Football a prayer and now look where we are.

I see posters on here complaining about DeVries recruiting and it just baffles me. 

[Stuhoo]

16 minutes ago, Artie86 said:

....does anybody else get the sneeky feeling that Coach DeVries and the players he brought in are going to suprise a lot of people in a positive way? I sort of get the feeling of "under the radar" and "sleeper". It definitely happened with IU Football. NO ONE gave Coach Cignetti and IU Football and prayer and now look where we are.

I see posters on here complaining about DeVries recruiting and it just baffles me. 

 

Yes; I very much get that feeling. I haven't said it in so many words because it sucks to eat the words after doing so, but I do get the feeling that this IUBB squad's potential is being notably underrated. There are three primary reasons for real optimism:

1. Each and every one of our top six players are seniors. Coachable, mature, D1-experienced seniors. 
2. Devries is a proven strong defensive coach. That won't completely overcome lack of athleticism, but experience + a good defensive system is a very big deal. Of note: IU's best defender last year was Leal, the least athletic guy in our rotation.
3. This team can shoot the ball. Better than any team from the Woodson and Archie eras.

(contrast this to the IU women's team this year: they are young and don't have many shooters. It could be rough)

[Scotty R]

1 hour ago, Artie86 said:

....does anybody else get the sneeky feeling that Coach DeVries and the players he brought in are going to suprise a lot of people in a positive way? I sort of get the feeling of "under the radar" and "sleeper". It definitely happened with IU Football. NO ONE gave Coach Cignetti and IU Football and prayer and now look where we are.

I see posters on here complaining about DeVries recruiting and it just baffles me. 

Some people just like to complain just to complain 

[Pagoda]

1 hour ago, Artie86 said:

....does anybody else get the sneeky feeling that Coach DeVries and the players he brought in are going to suprise a lot of people in a positive way? I sort of get the feeling of "under the radar" and "sleeper". It definitely happened with IU Football. NO ONE gave Coach Cignetti and IU Football and prayer and now look where we are.

I see posters on here complaining about DeVries recruiting and it just baffles me. 

I’m still optimistic for several reasons:

1) He wanted this job, the process with him started months before his hire.  So he’s had a vision for what he can do here for some time.  Scott hired him, and I’ve been very impressed with Scott.

2) A few people who have worked with him, both in the AD and external on the NIL front (so not IU fans), told me they are very impressed.

3) I generally like his staff.  Notably Bargen.

4) He seems to be bringing in high character guys.

5) I just get the sense he knows what he’s doing and is going through his process of building a team and program from wreckage Woody left him.

He won’t generate much buzz from the media — he doesn’t hobnob much with them.  Maybe the roster concerns are valid, maybe not, we’ve got to see what he can get from these guys.  I get we didn’t land some HS recruits, but on the other hand we haven’t played a game and the recruiting cycle isn’t over.  I hesitate to critique the sausage making process when it’s early and I have little insight into what is actually going on behind the scenes on that front.

We’ll see.  I think we’ll have ups and downs, but overall I’d guess CDD outperforms the bubble projections and makes the tourney without much drama and builds from there.  That would be great.  That’s my view until any red flags appear that suggest he can’t succeed here.  Red flag examples are getting blown out by Indiana St. at home, being an NBA guy new to college bball, or clear losing trends on the court or recruiting.  Pretty basic red flags.

All we can do is hope for the best.  May as well.  It’s out of our control.

[Stuhoo]

15 minutes ago, Scotty R said:

Some people just like to complain just to complain 

 

^^Complaining about people that "like to complain just to complain"^^