FIXING IU HOOPS — The Weekly Opine

This may be Indiana’s last chance to restore its once mighty men’s basketball program. (Photo credit The Weekly Opine)

Missing the Big Dance now an annual rite

For college basketball fans, is there a worse feeling than watching the unveiling of the March Madness 68-team bracket, and your favorite team is not among the names called? The anxiety is palpable when your team is on the bubble. As the four regions – East, South, Midwest and West – are filled out, sweat drips from your face like water drops at Niagara Falls. When the tournament roll call ends, if your team is not included, anxiousness gives way to crushing disappointment.

Conversely, you endure weekslong resignation when your team – in my case Indiana University’s men’s team – loses their last five regular season games. The Hoosiers, earlier this season considered a shoo-in #11 seed, faltered when it mattered most, failing to qualify for the NCAA tourney.

IU’s pratfall was cemented when they lost their sixth consecutive game – this time to Rutgers – ending their season at the Big Ten tournament. The notion that Rutgers would beat Indiana in basketball, three times in the same season, would have been unthinkable in past years. But it happened, and then again and again.

Despite prognostications that IU would have qualified for the NCAA tournament last season (if the pandemic had not cancelled the tournament), I do not think it was guaranteed. In other words, IU fans would have sweated out the announcement of the 68-team field last year.

IU’s reality? The men’s basketball team is on an opposite trajectory compared to the IU women’s team. The women are in the capable hands of Teri Moren, completing her 7th year as coach, punctuated with five consecutive 20-win seasons. Moren has assembled a Top-20 program, with the Lady Hoosiers now making annual trips to the NCAA tournament.

Astonishingly, the men’s team at IU has made just one Elite Eight appearance (2002) and just a single Final Four appearance (2002) in the 21st Century. Tantamount to basketball blasphemy.

Astonishingly, there are still out-of-touch IU fans who continue to speak glowingly of Indiana basketball, as if it remains a feared, blue-blood program. Two years ago, I opined in this space that IU basketball was at the confluence of irrelevance and delusion. It’s still true. And the cop out refrain “at least IU players graduate” shows how desperate some Hoosier Nation fans have become.

IU players graduating is a given. That has almost always been the case. What is different now is IU players are graduating without winning a Big Ten championship or playing in the NCAA tournament.

Now that Bob Knight finally returned last season, Indiana’s program and Hoosier Nation must become more progressive and face the future. (Photo credit ESPN screenshot)

Coaching carousel

Since the great Bob Knight was rightfully fired in 2000, IU has employed a veritable merry-go-round full of coaches: Mike Davis. Kelvin Sampson. Dan Dakich (interim). Tom Crean. Archie Miller. Each had good coaching qualities. Each was not up to the challenge of bringing hoops glory back to IU. Davis and Crean came close. Davis’ improbable Final Four run before losing the title game in 2002, and Crean’s 2012-2013 team, ranked #1 in the nation during the season, temporarily scratched IU fans’ itch. But neither man was able to sustain high-level success. In the end, the inability to consistently recruit the best of Indiana’s annual bumper crop of high school talent helped do-in Davis and Crean.

Now, Archie Miller was fired this week. Miller floated into Bloomington after delivering Dayton four straight NCAA tournament appearances and a run to the Elite Eight in 2014. Unfortunately, in Bloomington it never became Miller Time. Instead, we quaffed four years of mediocrity, with Miller’s final team sinking to unbearable, unacceptable, and unwatchable status.

From the start it was apparent Miller was over his head. A defensive-minded coach in an era when the game requires strategic offensive firepower, Miller’s overreliance on “D” sometimes turned winnable games into losses. Archie-ball surely was not attractive to big-time recruits, who want to display their talent on offense. IU’s 3-point shooting was woeful. Miller’s teams played like they were unprepared. IU was not fundamentally sound, missing too many free throws and turning the ball over too frequently, with a loosey-goosey style. His insistence on a three-guard lineup, lacking reliable 3-point shooters, was maddening. Overall, the program lacked enthusiasm.

Miller did not display the coaching acumen, recruit enough talented players, or develop team toughness required to compete for Big Ten championships or on the national stage.

Under Archie Miller, IU never made it to the Big Dance. After four middling seasons, Miller deserved to be fired.

Pay now or pay later

A few months ago, the consensus was IU would suck it up and wait at least another year, when Miller’s guaranteed payout would drop substantially, compared with the $10 million IU now owes him. However, the way this season disintegrated even the most patient fans called for – and received - Archie’s scalp. He was booed at the Big Ten tournament when introduced; was jeered with chants of “Fire Archie” late in the game; and was booed while walking off the court following IU’s season-ending loss to Rutgers.

Apparently, two alumni “philanthropists” stepped up to cover the $10 million IU now owes Archie Miller for firing him with three years remaining on his contract. (At a moment when universities eliminate valuable staff as the landscape of college changes, it is sickening to see a coach get paid $10 million for failing, even if it was “outside” money.)

On the other hand, keeping Archie would likely have cost IU alumni donations, lost revenue from consistently missing the NCAA tournament, lost revenue from playing in a half empty Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall, and lost sponsorship revenue as the once-juggernaut Indiana brand suffered further erosion.

Oh, say can you ever see…another championship banner hanging in Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall? (Photo credit The Weekly Opine)

A short list

One of the beautiful things about college basketball is a program can be turned around in a year or two. Hire the right coach, recruit a few studs, and presto, you are back in business.

Indiana cannot afford another mistake. Hiring on potential won’t cut it. What is required is a proven winner who plays by the rules. A strategic coach. A demanding coach not afraid to “get after” his team and hold players accountable. A coach who attracts top talent and develops players so they demonstrably improve each year.

Who not to hire:

Suggestions to hire former-Michigan coach John Beilein are without merit. Beilein did an excellent job coaching at Michigan. But he is 68 years old. IU needs someone with whom to build long-term.

His name has not surfaced much recently, but still there are Indiana faithful who clamor for Steve Alford. Stop. Alford demonstrated, at Iowa and UCLA, that he is nothing more than a Sweet Sixteen coach (barely). While at Iowa, before the facts were known, Alford defended a star player credibly accused of sexual assault. It was shameful then and rings even more shameful now, in the era of #metoo.

IU needs a championship caliber, Final Four-level coach.

Who to pursue:

Former-Butler, and current Boston Celtics head coach Brad Stevens should be sought. Stevens professes he is committed to the pro game. Dangle an otherworldly, significant financial offer and see if he bites. If Stevens were going to leave Boston, now would be a good time as the Celtics championship window, seemingly open-ended a couple of years ago, might be closing.

At only 44 years old, Stevens is young enough to lead the IU program for two decades. He guided Butler to consecutive NCAA title games in 2010 and 2011 so Stevens is a proven winner. Recruiting-wise, the best high school players want to play for coaches with strong NBA ties, which Stevens certainly has. One hiccup could be that, having lived in Indianapolis and now Boston, Stevens may not want the college town lifestyle.

Chris Beard, currently head coach at Texas Tech, is another strong candidate. Beard, at 48 years old, is a younger version of Illinois coach Brad Underwood (who, by the way, arrived at Illinois the same year Archie Miller began coaching IU). Beard coaches his players hard, is demanding, and his teams play a tough, hard-nosed style that would endear him to Indiana fans.

Beard took his team to the Final Four in 2019, losing in the national title game to Virginia. It would be a logical next step for a coach of Beard’s pedigree to move up to the Big Ten and resurrect Indiana’s basketball fortunes. I have no idea about Beard’s politics, but if ever there was a time to leave the state of Texas, now is as good a time as any.

Unless things quickly turn around, packed crowds for IU home games may be a thing of the past. (Photo credit ESPN screenshot)

Another candidate is Loyola coach Porter Moser. Moser took Loyola to the Final Four in 2018 and has a reputation for player development. His teams are tough and play a hard-nosed style of basketball. Offensively, his best teams play with offensive balance, excelling inside and out. His teams play a fine brand of team basketball, sharing the rock without regard to who scores.

Moser says he is happy at Loyola. However, he may be enticed by the challenge of stepping up to the Big Ten while remaining relatively close to home (he grew up in suburban Chicago). Moser reminds me of Villanova’s Jay Wright. Moser is a dapper man who oozes stage presence. He also is a proven, damn fine basketball coach. Like Stevens, a classic college town atmosphere may not be what Moser desires, having lived in the Chicago area much of his life.

IU fans clamor for one of Knight’s “guys” to come back to lead the program but in my opinion, it’s time to put Coach Knight in the review mirror.

Out of time

Whatever direction IU decides upon, as it chooses its next head coach, this feels like “last call.”

Another cycle of uninspired basketball, devoid of championships, and Assembly Hall, fondly known as the Carnegie Hall of hoops arenas, will have a better likelihood of filling up with mothballs than with fans.