So there I stand at Drake’s on 82nd Street in Indianapolis picking up some carry out, and the Indiana game against Penn State starts. A guy I met because he listens to my radio show asks, “Are you sticking around for the Indiana game?” “Nope, just picking up some food,” I tell him. As I […]
Tonight will be a great night of college hoops for those of us in central Indiana who view it as one of America’s four major leagues, and the scheduling gods have smiled on us again as the two big games don’t conflict with one another. Butler hosts Georgetown at 7p (FS1), and Indiana will take on […]
Wednesday night, Calgary Flames defenseman Dennis Wideman cross-checked a linesman to the ice on his way to the bench. He has since been suspended by the NHL pending an investigation. That overt violent act against a professional official brought to mind a series of things athletes and coaches should never do on and off the […]
Indiana held serve through its first seven Big Ten games against sub-par team this season – a season where coach Tom Crean is fighting to keep his job despite the gravity of fan dissatisfaction. Early season losses to Wake Forest, UNLV, and Duke showed the same variety of difficulties (defensive deficiencies in both scheme and […]
You see them every game at the end of the bench, cheering for their teammates. They enthusiastically greet the starters and key subs every timeout. Every once in awhile – a little bit more often recently as IU has won three of its last four by at least 25 points – they get a couple […]
If Indiana beats Illinois tonight at Assembly Hall in Bloomington, the Hoosiers will have put together a 6-0 Big Ten start for the first time in the Tom Crean era. There was a bit of panic among Hoosiers fans after a two-loss trip to Maui and a less than competitive trip to Duke, but Indiana […]
We were tragically reminded yesterday of the bond that continues to exist between Brad Stevens and the players he coached at Butler University prior to his accepting the job as coach of the Boston Celtics. Brad visited Andrew Smith last week to say goodbye, and spoke of his passing with eloquence and raw emotion in a […]
By all accounts, Andrew Smith is dying. His death “is imminent”, according to the latest post from Samantha Smith, Andrew’s wife, on her website. It’s hard to be reflective without rancor about the death of a 25-year-old, but Samantha has been so courageous and eloquent about the fight she and Andrew continue to wage that it’s […]
Yesterday afternoon we heard Boston Celtics coach Brad Stevens would miss his team’s game last night to tend to a personal matter in Indianapolis. We know now that he came home to visit Andrew Smith, one of his former players who is battling cancer. Stevens would prefer no one knows why he is in Indianapolis, […]
Indiana University’s basketball program is not where anyone wants it to be – not fans, not coaches, not administrators, and not players. You can tell coaches aren’t happy with where Indiana is in the present because they spend a lot of time and effort selling everyone on a future filled with accomplishment and success. […]