'Cat food

 Your Indiana Hoosiers checked out of the basketball season last night -- I suppose we should say probably checked out, or more than likely checked out -- and suddenly the taunt comes back to me, ancient now, an artifact moldering away in the history books like those five NCAA championship banners hanging at one end of Assembly Hall.

The taunt went like this, back in the days when Bob Knight and his mighty Hoosier legions used to come to Welsh-Ryan Arena and tattoo the Northwestern Wildcats eleventy-hundred to twelve or whatever:

That's all right ... that's OK ... you'll all work for us someday!

That was the go-to for those snobby smart punks in the Northwestern student section when the game was hopelessly lost. The implication, of course, being that someday Northwestern grads would be running the country, and IU grads would be asking them, "Would you like to make that a Valu Meal?"

Fast-forward to Wednesday night in the United Center up in Chicago, where it was the Wildcats once again doing the tattooing. 

The final this time was Northwestern 74, Indiana 61 in the first round of the Big Ten tournament, Darian DeVries' crew going down without much of a fight. Leading by a point at the break, the Hoosiers were outscored 38-24 in the second half, getting nothing from pretty much everyone except Lamar Wilkerson, who scored 17, and Tatyon Conerway off the bench, who added 14.

Except for Wilkerson, no Indiana starter scored more than six points. And the Hoosiers' two big men, Sam Alexis and Reed Bailey, managed all of two rebounds in a combined 50 minutes of playing time.

Two rebounds. In 50 minutes.

Northwestern's Nick Martinelli, meanwhile, flame-broiled Indiana again, going for 28 points on 10-of-18 shooting. This was just a couple of weeks after he dropped 28 on the Hoo-Hoo-Hoo-Hoosiers in Assembly Hall, as IU blew a big lead and lost 72-68.

It was one more "L" in a season-ending spiral that saw DeVries' guys lose six of their last seven games and likely fall out of the NCAA Tournament picture, although somehow the bracket bros still have them on the bubble. The loss also was a significant one, because it was Indiana's sixth straight to Northwestern going back to 2021.

Wednesday's loss made it seven straight. 'Cat food, apparently, is what the Hoosiers of the 2020s are right now.

And now the ancient taunt resurfaces, if slightly altered. It goes like this now:

That's all right ... that's OK ... at least your football team can play!

Who'd a thunk it?