Happy-to-hustle Hoosiers back on title track after slaying Michigan
By CHRIS GOFF
ISL Correspondent
This time, the rebound careened away from Cody Zeller, instead of right to him. And when the loose ball headed for the other side of the lane in the direction of Nik Stauskas and Trey Burke, Zeller absolutely seemed out of the picture.
But Zeller shot forward like an overgrown Olympic sprinter, unassuming, hungry and aware of his own abilities.
To an extent, it was a microcosm of what happened Saturday night and what is happening in the bigger picture in college basketball – the Indiana Hoosiers are unwilling to settle and are beating the field to all destinations, be they talent, confidence, smarts, points or tenacity.
“I was just trying to keep it alive,” Zeller said. “It was big. I always pride myself on making the hustle plays.”
Even with the clock approaching midnight?
“Every game should be at 9 (p.m.),” the sophomore center said. “I like it because it gives me more time to nap.”
The only guys caught napping Saturday night were in maize and blue for Michigan, which saw Stauskas and Glenn Robinson III fire blanks, big men forget to box out and a No. 1 ranking go up in smoke.
Suddenly the Wolverines seem human, and the Hoosiers nudged ahead of them in the nation’s collective perception by virtue of climbing to the top of the Big Ten minefield and exposing barely any chinks in their armor in the process.
An awesome offensive squad led by guards Burke and Tim Hardaway Jr., Michigan proved it still has a ways to go on defense.
Soon-to-be top-ranked Indiana is further along on that end of the floor, and the Hoosiers’ overall ceiling is higher than anyone else’s ceiling because of the learning curve with key freshman pieces such as Yogi Ferrell and Jeremy Hollowell.
On Saturday, Indiana’s offensive attack was jaw-dropping. But its defense did the job, holding Michigan to 73 points – five below the Wolverines’ season average.
One factor that intervenes in a complete pronunciation of Indiana’s superiority is that Michigan was not at full strength. The Wolverines had starting center Jordan Morgan for all of two minutes because of a nasty ankle injury. Morgan’s absence somewhat reduced the team’s interior strength right at the time it faced its greatest test.
But doubts about the Hoosiers may be dwindling to extinction.
For starters, they have the most chemistry. On ESPN’s College GameDay, Victor Oladipo and Christian Watford were asked a series of four to five questions each about the other – and only one answer was incorrect. Oladipo thought coach Tom Crean was the one pushing Watford to trim his beard; turns out, Watford’s academic adviser is behind the shave campaign. Trivial in content, sure, but the quiz pried a small window into how intimately Indiana’s players know each other’s lives off the court.
They also have the best center. In college, guards are king, and the Hoosiers have made theirs into fine players. But the most successful teams inevitably field prowess in the middle which goes a long way toward winning a championship. Kentucky, North Carolina, Florida and Connecticut have been recent examples.
On a bitterly cold evening in February, Indiana played from ahead for most of the night. And it was the 7-foot Zeller who keyed everything, going 8-for-10 with 19 points, 10 rebounds and superb rim protection. As players around him, from both schools and all shapes and sizes, seemed to be pressing beneath the glare of a made-for-TV showdown, Zeller never did.
This 81-73 outclassing of Michigan represented – given the opponent – Indiana’s best overall effort of the season, as the Hoosiers started looking again like the team that spent all summer and fall considered national favorites by the punditry.
The Wolverines surged from 15 down midway through the first half to tie the game at 40 early in the second, but Watford caught a pass in deep – perhaps the most important executed possession of the game – forcing Hardaway to reach in. The resulting free throws turned the momentum back Indiana’s way, and an 11-0 run had Crean waving his arms in sheer joy as Michigan coach John Beilein dourly signaled for a timeout.
Burke, the nation’s best point guard, saw a bunch of Hoosiers take a turn in front of him on defense. Oladipo was there at times. Small forward Will Sheehey guarded Burke for a stretch late in the first half. Backup point guard Remy Abell drew the assignment when he was in the game. Ferrell, who moves his feet and defends with smarts that belie his age, was as solid as Abell.
Of course, Burke compiled 25 points and eight assists, but he shot just 9 for 24 and attempted only four free throws. The Ohio native worked awfully hard for his offense, throwing in some long, off-balance jumpers, and when push came to shove, Burke fizzled down the stretch.
In the final 4 ½ minutes, the sophomore missed the front end of a 1-and-1 and scored just three points on a late triple with the outcome all but decided. Burke missed 10 of 14 field-goal attempts in the second half.
The truth is, the Hoosiers didn’t play as well as they could have. Sheehey is a gunner who was a little too brash in looking for his shot and scored just two points in 21 minutes. Indiana missed several open looks and messed up many an easy opportunity; for the game the Hoosiers took 20 fewer shots than Michigan and committed twice as many turnovers (16-8).
But Watford (14 points, 10 rebounds) utterly crushed his matchup with Robinson III, a freshman who gives Michigan 12 points and six boards a game. On this night the son of former NBA star Glenn Robinson had two points on 1-for-6 shooting in 40 minutes. Some scorers would print that line in the box score as “DNP: invisible.”
And Hollowell was brilliant on Saturday, with four points, four boards, three blocks and one assist in 10 minutes as the primary frontcourt sub. The forward from Indianapolis served up some rough-and-tumble energy in the paint.
With tension in the air, stakes high and expectations higher, the Hoosiers were not just more skilled than Michigan – what’s scary is the Hoosiers could pretty much get any shot they wanted offensively – but hungrier and scrappier.
Forget lax defense – the Hoosiers don’t play it, and opponents could never get away with it.
What Indiana accomplished Saturday was world class. Six more of those in March and April would equal a sixth banner.
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