Hoosier Notions

 Indiana welcomes another cardboard cutout to Assembly Hall tonight, presumably with a left to the jaw, a right to the ribcage and a boot to the tender regions. Thanks for coming, Kennesaw State!

The Hoosiers surely needed Kennesaw and that other apple turnover (Elon) this week, because the team everyone thought they were got exposed as something less in the two games previous. First it was No. 5 Arizona that flamed them by 14; then, a week later, No. 4 Kansas flattened them by 22 in a game where the Hoosiers' effort, execution and general basketball-ness felt like a visitation from the Ghost of Archie Miller Past.

Quite a shock to a Hoosier fan base that figured THIS was the team it had been tramping through the wilderness to find after that blowout of North Carolina. Finally, Indiana played like Indiana. And all it took was to bring in a Bob Knight acolyte, Mike Woodson, to make it happen.

Hoosier Nation was ready to put up a statue of Woody after Carolina.

Now some IU followers, not overreacting at all, are chipping away at it.

Suddenly, Woody doesn't work hard enough. And he ignores the advice of his staff. And his players look like they have no direction on offense, and they're constantly out of position defensively, and, and, and ...

The Blob has heard all of the above from various precincts in the last couple weeks, and it can only shake its head. Heard it all before, many times. The capriciousness is never not predictable, because it always turns on a dime depending on what Coach's boys did the last time out.

One week statuary; the next, a mortuary for Coach's tenure. So it goes.

What I think about this is Woodson's team wasn't as good as its 7-0 start and thrashing of North Carolina suggested, and it's not as bad as Kansas 84, Indiana 62. The talent that revealed itself in the dropkicking of North Carolina is still there, but that game and the steady diet of Frosted Mini-Wheats to start the season perhaps gave Hoosier Nation some false Hoosier Notions. 

Like, We're really THAT GOOD.

Well ... perhaps not, at least yet. The Arizona and Kansas games indicated size inside is going to bother the Hoosiers, and in particular All-American Trace Jackson-Davis, whose skill set is extensive but does not match that of a traditional pivot. And, of course, losing point guard Xavier Johnson to a foot injury for an extended period is not going to help matters.

And yet, Johnson included, almost every returning player on the Indiana roster is better than he was last year, or seems to be. The freshmen are good but -- with the exception of Jalen Hood-Schifino, who's already excelling -- not as good as they will be. That's something to hang onto. 

In the meantime, here comes another get-well card in Kennesaw State. Which figures to soften another blow to Indiana's esteem.

See the score from Kansas last night?

The Jayhawks beat Harvard. But only by 14.

In other words, Harvard put up a better fight than Indiana. Harvard.

"See? Even Harvard has a better coach (Tommy Amaker) than Woodson," they'll say in some parts of Hoosier Nation.

Sigh.