lol

Afraid I have to agree with you on those statements.

Losing Luke Fischer to transfer right before the start of the conference season didn’t help matters – I feel like if he would’ve stayed, he could’ve started a few games at the 5 and given Noah the opportunity to play at the 4 instead of out of position. Even if Fischer wasn’t a huge scorer, his presence might’ve been enough to make a difference and swing the outcome of a few close games in favor of the Hoosiers. Fischer has a good midrange shot, too, so that would’ve helped against some of the defenses IU has seen this season.

I feel like this year has been a “Murphy’s Law” type of season – anything that could go wrong, did. That doesn’t absolve CTC or the players from their responsibility for the season, though – I’m just saying that there were a lot of unforeseeable circumstances (LF transfer, HMP OWI, NV injury) that contributed to the season not going according to plans.

They can play and lose all of those too!

It’s Tournament time, dude. Wipe the slates clean and start over. Re-boot time. Anything can happen!

Keep Crean out of the way and put him with the cheerleader squad where he does his best work and let our guys do what they came to IU to do – Win games!

I think the biggest hurdle is winning 4 games in a row which is something this team hasn’t done in the Big 10 season.

Agree. You are what your record says you are. In IU’s case that’s a team just over .500 and a losing conference record.

On any given night IU is capable of beating any team in the Big 10. But they haven’t won 4 games in a row since they started the season 5-0 and we all know the competition level those games was not high. So there is no way I can say with any confidence that now this team is going to go on a four game win streak and win the tournament.

Yea, no one said it was an easy road, only that we think it’s one of the easier roads. You failed to mention that we beat 2 of the 3 and nearly beat the third.

I think you put too much stock in preseason media rankings. None of us knew what deck we were handed (including a midseason transfer of a skilled big man on a team already lacking size). We got a top 25 ranking based on reputation. UK was 1 or 2. Look at them doing their best Tom Petty (that’s free falling).

In order for Crean to be an elite coach in your mind, what do you think this team needs to accomplish in the B1G tourney?And more importantly, why is it now time for him to put up or shut up? We know we’re dealing with a maddeningly inconsistent team. Do you honestly think Crean can get these guys to flip a switch that quickly?

Iuloo – You are way missing the point because you want to rant about the polls. The point is that IU was expected by most observers and yes polls to be in contention for an NCAA bid this year, even if they only received 3-4 votes that was good enough. IU has sunk out of view. This is the time to live up to expectations.
As for the polls you’re wrong on that also. The odds of picking 25 teams and getting them all correct in the final analysis is difficult. There are injuries, transfers etc. With over 300 teams picking 25 at random would leave you with with maybe 3 in the Top 25. My guess is that at least half of the original top 15or os are still in the Top 25.

True. And talk about a coach on the hot seat! Those fans up there forget that it is Iowa, after all.

I understand what both of you are saying, but as far as match ups are concerned it works out as a best case scenario for us. Yes, IU hasn’t played well for 3 games in a row all year. Personally, I don’t think that they will now, but who knows. As far as match ups go, we lost to Illinios in overtime at there place and handled them well at ours. If the “decent” IU team shows up we should beat Illinois. Crean, for whatever reason, seems to give Behlien fits, and Michigan doesn’t match up well with us. We will have to play well, but Michigan doesn’t “scare” me. If Ohio St. gets past Nebraska, we match up well with them also, because they can’t hit a jump shot to save their life. The only “bad” match up will be in the final against Wiscy or M St. Of course IU has to show up, and that has been a major issue. We shall see.

UK and MSU both started the season ranked #1 and #2 and now neither team is ranked after losing this weekend.

Playing Illinois, Michigan, and possibly Nebraska. All 3 teams beat IU already. I’m not sure why you like their shot at making the championship game. Also this team hasn’t put together three good games in a row since non conference.

BTW – I am guilty of saying earlier in the season that we were near as good/talented as the other Big Ten teams. We kept it close in a lot of those games, but over and over again we haven’t been able to close them out with wins and that correlates with being as good or talented. If they do a 180 in the coolness and clutch department at the end of games, I will put hope there.