After going bust in Las Vegas losing both games, the Hoosiers hope to get back on the winning track tonight as they open Big Ten play against Penn State (7-4).
Indiana enters conference play at 9-4; 9-0 at home this year and 0-4 away from Assembly Hall.
IU had a productive Christmas break. In fact, the players were unable to go home and only took Christmas Day off after returning from Las Vegas. The Nittany Lions have only played once in the last 15 days, a 74-64 home loss to Maine.
Tonight’s game tips-off at 6:30 EST on the Big Ten Network. Fans staying at home and watching the game on television will have an all-star cast on the call. The vivacious and loud Gus Johnson will be joined with former IU star and current Indiana Pacers broadcaster Quinn Buckner in his Big Ten Network debut.
Things to look for tonight:
- Jordan Hulls needs to shoot more often. He is making over 52% of his shots from beyond the arc.
- Maurice Creek has yet to make an impact this season. Creek was injured 364 days ago.
- Christian Watford played way too much one-on-one ball in Vegas. He forced too many shots and needs to get his teammates involved.
- Tom Pritchard and Derek Elston were very sick with the flu in Vegas a week ago. They should have recovered but it will be something to keep your eye on.
- Will Sheehey injured his right ankle in the second half of the Colorado game. It didn’t look too serious and hopefully he will be able to play.
Notes:
- The Hoosiers lead the Big Ten and are fourth in the country in field goal percentage (51.3 percent) and second in the league field goal percentage defense (37.7 percent).
- Penn State has lost two straight (Virginia Tech, Maine).
- Talor Battle leads the Nittany Lions, averaging 20.6 points to go with 5.4 rebounds and is shooting 38.5 percent from 3-point range.
Here are Tom Crean’s twitter posts following Las Vegas:
We constantly have to keep working on building our defensive mindset and then the fundamentals and technique we are teaching can be consistent. We made way too many mistakes with our feet and lack of active hands on shooters in Las Vegas. We have to continue to learn to stop one-on-one is to have great help defense in place before the driver starts the action. Our footwork regressed the last 2 games.
Indiana has dominated the the series 28-7, and won last year in Happy Valley 67-61, in their only meeting of the season.