IUBB at Kentucky - Saturday, 12.13.25 @ 7:30 on ESPN

[ronzo4IU]

Not a consolation but Pope is doing worse with more.

[Uspshoosier]

11 minutes ago, Kentuckysucks said:

Yeah.  Need to go 12-8 to even be on the bubble.  We have zero quality wins.  And with how our B1G schedule is set up we won't have many opportunities.  We aren't beating any good teams on the road.

Kansas St is a Q2 win as of now.  They will have at least 14 opportunities for a Q1 or Q2 win.  Protect home court and steal some on the road.    If IU went 12-8 in the B1G they won’t be on the bubble they will be comfortably in especially if their predictive  metrics are top 30 like they are now 

[ronzo4IU]

30 minutes ago, WayneFleekHoosier said:

I’d like to be inside that locker room.  The coaches room particularly.  The realization of we are not as good as we thought we’d be must be setting in.  Due to strong roster restriction the staff has one hand tied behind its back(they put it there themselves) as we aren’t big or athletic enough to do things to compete with good teams.   I think we are at the point of praying the 3s drop.  
 

Staff needs to find a way to get our 3 shooters as many open looks as possible throughout the game.  Cut Enrights minutes way down. Teach Conerway to play time/score .  (Neither PG option gives us what we need) Drake I don’t think does either.

At the 5?  Who knows.  Neither guy gives us what a winning team needs.  
 

Gotta score at a high efficiency clip to offset the defensive liabilities.  

I would argue TC/LM and Bailey (for a big man) are pretty athletic…then there’s a size able drop off.

Not trying to pile on here but one thing I have not understood is why we went 3/4 of the way around the world to bring in a Serbian big who will not even be close to seeing the floor this year. There were several guys around his size that we played on teams like Lindenwood {would have to go back and look at those rosters again ) that would’ve been a far better option.imo.
 

If anything I’ve learned from Cignetti is that a really good coach these days especially with NIL knows and zeros in on exactly the right type of player they are looking for to fit their program .  (AKA Dusty May).

Hoping Devries can get it figured out because he does actually have a good track record.

[Pagoda]

IU gave CDD $10M for players.  Where was more money going to come from?  Sure as hell not football.  Maybe we could have cut some non-rev sports...

I don't disagree with the critiques and the results have clearly been not great to start out.  My view on this has always been how good is CDD as a coach and less about how much money he got for players.  $10M is not chump change.  If CDD can't make the tourney with $10M, it's hard to make a case to give him more.  Money won't fix what's limiting him and he'll keep underachieving.

I can't control IUBB, so I've got to hope CDD figures it out.  While that's looking less likely than I would prefer, it is still early and it's not impossible.  But yea, I'm worried.

[Kentuckysucks]

Not good Darian.  Not good.

https://x.com/i/status/2000039880068333603

[str8baller]

38 minutes ago, Pagoda said:

10M is not chump change.  If CDD can't make the tourney with $10M, it's hard to make a case to give him more.  Money won't fix what's limiting him and he'll keep underachieving.

I’m going to talk myself into the following rationale—true or not—for my own sanity: it was a quick transition, he didn’t have much time or a full staff and Devries was operating with one hand tied behind his back. 
 

His son and Enright are obvious gets at the right price. Alexis is fine. Wilkerson was a good land even though he can’t get his own offense. But I don’t know how you could scout Bailey and Conorway has B1G caliber athletes. I can see how Conorway was a good midmajor player against lesser athletes because he just likes to beat guys off the dribble and create. Can’t do that here. I can’t for the life of me see how Bailey made an all-conf team in the A-10 of all places. 
 

Unless Sisley blossoms into an All-Conf type player in the offseason, Devries has to bring 4-5 new starters next year. He can’t whiff on them like this year. And if he brings in all seniors again because the heat is on from a bad first season, he gets to start year 3 much the same. You can see how things can snowball in an unfavorable direction. So yea, I’m guessing you’re right on the money with the fact nobody is going to be rushing to shove NIL cash at the program so long as Cig exists and we’re a perpetual also ran in basketball. 

[Pagoda]

10 minutes ago, str8baller said:

Unless Sisley blossoms into an All-Conf type player in the offseason, Devries has to bring 4-5 new starters next year. He can’t whiff on them like this year. And if he brings in all seniors again because the heat is on from a bad first season, he gets to start year 3 much the same. You can see how things can snowball in an unfavorable direction. So yea, I’m guessing you’re right on the money with the fact nobody is going to be rushing to shove NIL cash at the program so long as Cig exists and we’re a perpetual also ran in basketball. 

Agree.  Personally, I wish he brought in more multi-year players that could develop and improve into a solid foundation for the next two to three seasons.  I was willing to think longer-term with the program building.  Maybe I'm wrong in wanting that approach.

But, like you noted we're going to have a pretty new team next season.  And if it doesn't work this season, I don't know why next season would be much better.  Ugh.  But we'll see if he can get this thing to work, it's still early blah blah blah.

[Kentuckysucks]

He needs to do better at spending his money.  If I had $10M I would probably try to get 3 studs at $2M each.  Then spend the other $4M on mid major guys I thought we're a good fit.  

He's probably gonna need $15M to compete for a B1G title and a FF though.

[Uspshoosier]

8 minutes ago, Pagoda said:

Agree.  Personally, I wish he brought in more multi-year players that could develop and improve into a solid foundation for the next two to three seasons

I don’t think there is such a thing as multi year players.   Nothing is stopping those kids from looking elsewhere after the first year.  

[Home Jersey]

2 minutes ago, Kentuckysucks said:

He needs to do better at spending his money.  If I had $10M I would probably try to get 3 studs at $2M each.  Then spend the other $4M on mid major guys I thought we're a good fit.  

If only DDV and the staff thought of that, lol. Much easier said than done. Not sure that's feasible anymore with NIL market rates.

[Pagoda]

Just now, Uspshoosier said:

I don’t think there is such a thing as multi year players.   Nothing is stopping those kids from looking elsewhere after the first year.  

I get that.  But you’ve got a pretty good chance to retain them.

Maybe I’m wrong.  And regardless I don’t think this is the primary issue with CDD (if there ends up being one).

[HoosierDevils]

I appreciate the comments from more optimistic and reasoned posters, despite that I recognize internally I feel super negative and down on IUBB even in this new coaching era. I’ll try to be as unemotional about this: I’m not surprised that we have games where we struggle when the 3 ball isn’t working and knew coming in that we’d have some bad losses and some good wins where we got hot from deep. My dismay is realizing that half that statement is true - we will have bad losses like Minnesota but it doesn’t look like we will get good shots against athletic teams with top level talent even if the team isn’t very good. The way Louisville who is very good and Kentucky who are not great shutdown this offense just with raw athleticism advantage at every position without a way to scheme out is really disappointing. It looks like DDV didn’t feel it necessary to drop the bag for top athletes in the HS class but I’m hoping this experience will tell them they need to find one or two transfers who are high major athletes and drop the bag. Just can’t do it with small unathletic mid major players on the entire roster. It’s not like they didn’t spend cash on this roster, they did and this is what they put together. 

[Kentuckysucks]

18 minutes ago, Home Jersey said:

If only DDV and the staff thought of that, lol. Much easier said than done. Not sure that's feasible anymore with NIL market rates.

Paying Bailey a $1M is a joke.  There were likely other true bigs he could've got for half that who would've been better.

[Home Jersey]

8 minutes ago, Kentuckysucks said:

Paying Bailey a $1M is a joke.  There were likely other true bigs he could've got for half that who would've been better.

No argument there

[Old Friend]

A wretched game....however I have but one main takeaway :

Scott Dolson cannot tolerate a lack of effort from this team or this coach; or be patient with him because of it.

I watched Connor Enright (who I cannot stand as a basketball player) actually get out of the way when he had an opportunity to take a charge.  I have watched Tucker make lazy play after lazy play, going half speed.  I watch garbage shot selection.  I watch an entire team fail to block out and give up offensive rebound after offensive rebound.  I see lazy passes.  I see no significant movement on offense.  I see no connectivity.  I see no leadership.  I see a consistent tolerance for mistakes and turnovers.  And I see a roster with no chance to compete in the Big Ten unless they make 12+ three point shots every night.   

Any team can move.  Any team can give effort.  Win or lose, I expect effort.  I expect to play hard.  I expect to NOT look like an intramural team firing up the first open 28 foot shot they find.   (I am very sure this will be unpopular to some and I couldn't care less)  If this is Darian DeVries' "look?"  His leash should be VERY short.  This has been several games in a row, now.  The brand of basketball against Penn State was awful.   Shots went it that night.  That was the only difference.  A quick, bad shot is a quick bad shot, even if it goes in.

[Hoosier987]

13 minutes ago, Kentuckysucks said:

Paying Bailey a $1M is a joke.  There were likely other true bigs he could've got for half that who would've been better.

Honestly…probably right here. Bailey is simply outclassed. All we really needed was a rim protector and rebounder, both of which Bailey is not…and to date, he’s hardly an offensive threat playing legit high major teams. I’m a DeVries believer, but not getting a legit rim protector / big in the portal was and is a head scratcher. 

[Stuhoo]

It’s a new era, and effective allocation of financial resources is paramount.

Use your portal budget to get Pat Coogan or Stephen Daley? Good times will follow.

Spend it on Reed Bailey? No bueno.

[WayneFleekHoosier]

To me the hopelessness as an Indiana basketball fan is where this 20 year journey is leading.  
 

The previous admin didn’t care. After the Knight ending, it took years but it was obvious, sports wasn’t a priority for them.  The fans endured through.  
 

The current admin cares.  They want to win.  NIL allows Indiana to be competitive vs those that have cheated for years.  This provides hope.  But we’ve squandered these opportunities as well.  And getting off on the wrong foot with yet another coaching hire will only make the job that much more difficult.  Each failed hire does that.  It all leads to a hopeless feeling.  Coaches get 3-4 years as a norm.  Year 1 (to me) is looking like a do-over.  But that will make year 2 increasingly difficult.  Just the way it goes. 
 

At this point I’m hoping we just don’t embarrass ourselves too much in year 1 so a plan can be developed for year 2.  But for feelings of being true contenders I’m at the point of near hopelessness as a fan.  So many of my family and friends have just lost IUBB from their lives over that past 10 years.  But many of them would return with winning.

Whats happening on the court was the exact thing I was fearful of all offseason.  
 

It’s not the same basketball world like the Crean days where you build over 3 years and by roster construction it was obvious that wasn’t DDVs plan.  Gotta salvage this season though to save his tenure.  Critical.  

[Home Jersey]

Scouting evaluation misses happen. Even to the best of coaches. It took Hurley four years to get UConn to 20 wins and in the fifth year he won a title. You can say that was pre-NIL and pre-portal or whatever and I will say what's that honestly matter? Expecting overnight results is silly and not realistic. Games like last night suck and make for a long season, just where the program is right now. Hopefully we see improvement year to year. You don't need haters with a fanbase like Indiana's lol

[Hoosierfan2017]

8 minutes ago, Stuhoo said:

It’s a new era, and effective allocation of financial resources is paramount.

Use your portal budget to get Pat Coogan or Stephen Daley? Good times will follow.

Spend it on Reed Bailey? No bueno.

Take IUBB’s NIL budget and bring Heismandoza back for another year (and save him from the Jets)? Very bueno.