Austan Kas, writing for the Crimson Quarry has a blog post entitled Road warriors: Indiana rallies past Michigan State. For those of you unfamiliar with the site, the Crimson Quarry is a great blog for following IU sports.
This most recent post was on the subject of Indiana’s first basketball win at Michigan State in 22 years. If that drought were a person, it would’ve been legally drunk after last night’s game. It was a near thing and hard to watch at the end. I don’t know if I can blame last night’s officiating on the NCAA’s worst referee, TV Ted Valentine. But, he was there, so I will. The guy running the Breslin Center’s game clock became mysteriously unable to start the clock when MSU was down by a couple of points with 13 seconds to go. After a vigorous monitor review, the officiating crew decided it’s not a foul when a MSU player punches Cody Zeller in the nuts. However, by contrast, it is a three-point shooting foul when Will Sheehey stands still and straight up while an MSU player shoots.
That grousing out of the way, the Hoosiers pulled off a narrow win on the strength of some strong play from Zeller, Watford, Hulls, and, of course, Oladipo. My favorite Oladipo play last night was when he was inbounding the ball under the basket. An MSU player was guarding an IU player with his back turned to Oladipo. Oladipo threw the ball off the MSU guy’s back, stepped in bounds, grabbed the ball, and laid it in. Meanwhile, Dick Vitale and Magic Johnson were too busy gabbing about something or other to even discuss the play at first.
So, the players and coaches – IU and Michigan State alike were high quality. The officiating, clock running, and commentating were all horrible. And IU gets a road win over the 4th ranked team in the country. In doing so, it solidified its hold on the Big Ten, its place at #1, and continues to make a case for itself as a 1 seed in the NCAA tournament. It still has big games against Ohio State and Michigan left on its schedule, then the Big Ten tournament; so there is a lot of tough basketball to come. But, after some time in the wilderness, it’s great to see the Hoosiers back among the top teams in the country.
Thanks for the link, Doug. It’s a bit dizzying. After 20 years of failing to beat a top 10 Big Ten team on the road, IU has done it twice in 10 days.
I am just glad that all the IU fans can put their Butler stuff back in the drawer and resume wearing their red and being obnoxious.
Some of them maybe even can consider taking the Texas Tech stuff to Goodwill.
Being from Ohio I never have been able to understand the venom from some in the IU/Purdue rivalry thing.
My daughter goes to Purdue and I’m happily cheering for IU. And Ohio State (I’m a 1983 grad). And any other Big Ten team. And Ball State too(my son goes there).
College sports are great. And college campuses are even better. We are really enjoying our 2 college students.
It’s interesting that you would say that. I have always considered IU-Purdue to be positively cordial compared to the rivalry between your alma mater and Michigan. Hell, Woody Hayes wouldn’t even say “Michigan.” He always called U-M “that school up north.”
Michigan being in another state changes things slightly.
And to be honest I never understood the hatred of Michigan by Ohioans either.
If Ohio isn’t going to win the National Championship I always root for whatever Big Ten team has a chance.
As for which one is a more cordial rivalry I just don’t know.
Oops, forgot.
IU looked mighty mighty powerful.
I am reliving the heady Al McGuire days at Marquette.