BLOOMINGTON — Indiana men’s basketball officially began its 2024-25 season on Wednesday, but it didn’t take long to feel like last year never ended.
IU ultimately got the job done in an 80-61 win over Southern Illinois Edwardsville at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall, but it was a bumpy ride. The Hoosiers leaned on a career night from Mackenzie Mgbako, who scored 31 points, to make up for some struggles elsewhere. And the team displayed some concerning tendencies along the way, things that previous Mike Woodson IU teams have struggled with as well.
Some issues will be alleviated as the season rolls along; the more time the Hoosiers spend on the court together, the more comfortable they’ll become with the way their teammates play. But chemistry and jelling only accounts for some of the concerns from opening night. Indiana, for several stretches of the game, looked like it doesn’t know what it wants to be offensively, and showed some lackluster defensive and rebounding efforts.
SIUE’s 16 offensive rebounds particularly stick out, for a team with much less size than IU.
“I just give them credit from a team standpoint. They wanted it a little bit more than we did. That’s something that can’t happen,” Woodson said about SIUE’s offensive rebounds. “I got to go back and break this film down and put them in front of the film and try to get better.”
Defensively, Indiana suffered from some of the same issues it had last season. The Hoosiers overhelped on several occasions, setting up wide open shots for the abandoned man. SIUE shot just 5 for 26 from 3-point range, but IU will face plenty of opponents who can better capitalize on those lapses.
Those sorts of issues, however, can be reasonably attributed to the still-developing chemistry. But being out of position and not hustling back on defense don’t have anything to do with this being the first game of the regular season. Things like that could cost IU games down the line.
The same thing goes for IU’s 16 turnovers. Myles Rice (five turnovers) and Oumar Ballo (four) were the biggest culprits, but seven different players committed at least one turnover.
Sure, some of the turnovers could be chemistry-related — passes that are just a little off, which should get corrected as the Hoosiers play more basketball with each other. And some were a byproduct of pushing the pace, something Woodson has talked about doing more of this season. But too many of the giveaways were just sloppy, careless plays.
One stretch in the first half combined most of those issues. An offensive rebound leading to a second-chance SIUE bucket, followed by two straight IU turnovers, which led to a fastbreak layup and a wide open 3-pointer. That three tied the game at 27 with 4:47 left in the half, and prompted Woodson to call timeout. The Assembly Hall crowd, surely having flashbacks to IU’s struggles in non-conference play last year, booed the team into the huddle.
IU did a good job rebuilding the roster in the offseason and put itself in much better position to succeed this year. But Indiana men’s basketball always carries the weight of expectations, and those offseason improvements meant high hopes for this team. The Hoosiers came into this season ranked No. 17 in the preseason AP Top 25, their second preseason ranking under Woodson. The IndyStar Big Ten preseason media poll picked Indiana to finish second in the conference this year, with a real chance to challenge Purdue for the title.
The expectations around this IU team are higher than last year’s team had. And internally, the Hoosiers have high aspirations as well. It all comes with the territory of playing for this program, and they can’t hide from it. If this team struggles in early-season games, given those expectations, fans could grow restless quickly.
“I think it’s great because we have high expectations for ourselves, as well. We’ve really come together and shared our goals together. We all know what our goals are. As a collective group, we’ve got to come together and find ways to keep doing those every day,” Galloway said. “Our focus is getting better in practice and being ready to go for those games. I think taking it one game at a time and trusting our work. Obviously there are expectations. We’re Indiana. The history of this place is phenomenal.”
With 2:34 left in Wednesday’s game, SIUE got a steal and a layup to cut the deficit to 14 points. It capped an 8-0 run that quieted an Assembly Hall crowd already celebrating a win. A student sitting near the media seats yelled, “Scoreboard!”
Indeed, the scoreboard was telling. The Hoosiers entered this game favored by 27 points, and even after a good stretch in the second half, they wouldn’t cover that number. In the short term, that only matters for anyone who gambled on the contest. But it illustrates the anticipated difference between these teams and the way Indiana was expected to dominate. That didn’t happen.
Margin of victory — for every game — factors into résumés down the road. IU’s narrow wins last season over non-conference opponents like Florida Gulf Coast, Army, and Wright State proved costly at the end of the year. While the Hoosiers won this game by a healthier margin than those Nov. 2023 examples, they got away with a bunch of things that have been persistent issues over the last few years. And SIUE has the second-lowest KenPom rating of any team on IU’s schedule this year. Stronger opponents could make IU pay for these miscues.
And games like these are even more important for this year’s team. These Hoosiers are not playing a particularly strong slate of non-conference games. They’re banking on dominating opponents like SIUE. And if they don’t, they could have some problems in March.
It’s not all doom and gloom on the Indiana side after the first game. Mgbako’s performance was extremely encouraging, as he looked the part of an All-Big Ten-caliber player. And the Hoosiers will have stronger performances around him in the future than they had on Wednesday. But if Mgbako regularly has to carry IU in games the way he did against SIUE, that would be a bad sign.
And if the red flags Indiana displayed on Wednesday become long-term trends instead of aberrations, it would be an even worse sign for this team’s outlook.
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