INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana’s game against Louisville was always going to be a barometer game.
After a season-opener against a College Football Playoff contender, and an FCS opponent in week two, this was IU’s first matchup of the season against a team around the caliber it can reasonably aspire to. It didn’t go IU’s way, as the Cardinals left Lucas Oil Stadium with a 21-14 win.
The Hoosiers seemed destined for a blowout loss in the first half, and then an impressive comeback in the second half. The end result was something in between. They have plenty to feel both good and bad about coming out of this game.
Here are a couple of those things that stand out.
The good: Tayven Jackson’s full-game debut
Tayven Jackson, in his first game since winning Indiana’s quarterback battle, experienced some ups and downs. But overall, the redshirt freshman performed well.
Jackson’s stat line turned out well: 24 of 34, 299 passing yards, one touchdown, one interception, and eight rushes for 11 yards, including sacks. But the numbers don’t tell his full story from this game. He sailed several throws high — not all were incompletions, thanks to some good plays by receivers. Jackson’s accuracy wasn’t perfect.
But as head coach Tom Allen said postgame, Jackson grew into the contest as it went along.
“There’s things that happen that you don’t always see, especially in the first half, just mistakes being young … But those will continue to get better and better. But I just love the fact that he just makes plays,” Allen said. “He’s got a lot of confidence, a lot of moxie that I’ve said from day one, one of his strengths. Those things are showing up.”
Jackson looked much more confident in the second half, buoyed by Indiana’s surprise onside kick. He displayed impressively strong pocket awareness for a redshirt freshman. His internal clock was typically on point — he may not have always been perfect in going through his progressions, but he always seemed to know when he needed to flee the pocket.
And he showed a lot of elusiveness in those moments. It wasn’t the same slippery style that Dexter Williams II plays with — Jackson wasn’t juking out defenders in the open field and breaking off big runs. He did attempt his best Michael Penix Jr. impression late in the game, diving for the pylon and nearly scoring an incredible touchdown which would’ve tied the score. But his ability to evade Louisville defenders stood out more.
When pass-rushers began closing in, Jackson was often able to shake them off, extend plays, and find an open receiver.
It can take a lot of time and game experience for some quarterbacks to develop the type of strong instincts Jackson played with on Saturday. He did take two sacks in the game, as IU’s offensive line struggled at times. But Jackson avoided disaster on several other occasions and turned them into nice offensive plays.
“I think there’s a lot of instinctual components to that, that a guy has a pocket presence to him, that he can feel. He knows where to step up to,” Allen said. “From my experience, the guy that has the ability to just feel it instinctually is pretty special. He seems to have that, which is great.”
Jackson had some well-placed balls as well. On the drive leading up to the consequential goal-line sequence, his 41-yard completion to Cam Camper in the fourth quarter was dropped in perfectly over the top.
He could’ve been better in some moments, undoubtedly. But for his first full game as Indiana’s quarterback, Tayven Jackson showed a lot of promise. There’s a strong foundation to build on here.
The bad: Game management
Indiana’s poor game management and coaching decisions may not have cost IU the game outright. Easy as it may be to pin the result on one specific moment, it’s a confluence of a lot of moments throughout the game.
But the mismanagement certainly didn’t make anything easier.
To be fair, this was not 60 minutes of coaching malpractice. Allen deserves a lot of credit for dialing up the onside kick to start the second half. Indiana needed a jolt coming out of the locker room, and that decision paid dividends. And offensive coordinator Walt Bell brought out some really well-designed plays at times, especially in the second half. This was the best he’s done at creatively getting Jaylin Lucas touches.
But Bell’s play-calling for much of the first half was more like his game plan against Ohio State: too conservative, and occasionally, misguided. IU’s offensive line struggled against Louisville’s defensive front, and yet Bell kept going to quarterback power runs with Jackson, basic runs up the middle, and option plays destined to fail. IU scored all 14 points in the third quarter, when Bell seemingly took the shackles off of Jackson and let him play his position more naturally. The Hoosiers were pretty balanced in running and passing plays in the other three quarters, but they attempted 14 passes and six rushes in that third quarter.
And, most glaringly, Bell’s calls were too vanilla in some of the biggest moments of the game. The Hoosiers had a fourth and three around midfield in the third quarter, with momentum on their side and a chance to apply real pressure to Louisville by making it a one-score game. And Bell went to a basic quick slants play. It didn’t work — there may have been unpenalized contact, but it was a bland call for a big spot.
The fourth down call at the goal line is the biggest example. From less than a yard away, IU tried a handoff to Josh Henderson — who was lined up deep, 10 yards behind the play. It was the most uncreative, predictable play to run in that spot. Bell has praised big Trent Howland, unprompted, multiple times — if the former linebacker is really in the group of trusted running backs, that would’ve been the spot to use him. Or — a wild idea — when you’re already that close to the end zone, a handoff may not be necessary when a quarterback sneak is an option.
Making it worse, the Hoosiers called timeout before that play to talk things over, and that’s what they came up with. This is where it returns to Allen. Indiana called five timeouts in this game — two in the first half, three in the second. And they all reflected poor game management.
In the first quarter, with the game still scoreless, Indiana burned timeouts on back-to-back plays — one to avoid a delay of game penalty, and one because someone didn’t like the look they saw from Louisville’s defense. And after that sequence, on a key third down on the outskirts of field goal range, Jackson forced a throw into double coverage which turned into an interception.
In the third quarter, the Hoosiers had to call timeout before a big defensive third down, because they were about to play that down with just 10 on the field. Then there was the timeout preceding the critical goal-line call. And then, as Louisville tried to run the clock out, Allen waited too long to call his final timeout. He watched the clock tick down from two minutes to 57 seconds remaining before calling it; it would’ve left the offense with much less time to work with if they were able to get one more chance.
Game management has never been Allen’s strongest suit as head coach, and it was rough again Saturday.
