After allowing Sam Houston State to score 46 points in the second half on Tuesday evening, Indiana head coach Mike Woodson expressed his displeasure with the lack of focus from his team and wanted to see change.
The second half of Indiana’s 76-57 win over Miami (OH) on Friday was the polar opposite of Tuesday night.
Indiana’s defense stymied the Miami offense, allowing only 21 points in the second half of the victory.
“I'll take it,” a smiling Woodson said. “I'll take that all day long. I know if we do that, we'll put ourselves in position to win basketball games.”
Not only was the stout defensive performance a departure from the last game, it was a complete contrast to the first half of Friday night’s game.
Miami scored 36 points, making 7-of-16 three-point attempts in the opening half. The high percentage was primarily due to Indiana’s inability to communicate switches properly, leading to wide-open attempts for the RedHawks.
“The looks came on our inability to not switch correctly. We screwed up so many switches tonight, I thought,” Woodson said. “Those are things that I just got to get us right.”
Indiana’s lack of communication leading to easy buckets for Miami became increasingly frustrating for the Hoosiers’ frontman.
“When you switch, that means you got a body on a body. Nobody's breaking free for easy shots,” Woodson said. “We gotta clean that up. That's something that we got to continue to work on and practice to get better.”
After holding a lead as big as 12 in the first half, Indiana began to crumble on both ends and saw the lead evaporate down to a three-point margin heading into the halftime break. It was a frustrating end to what started as an impressive showing from an Indiana team desperate for a consistent 40-minute showing.
“It is early. We got to learn quick, and we can't have those breakdowns. There was a lot tonight,” red shirt senior Trey Galloway said. “I think it's just our attention to detail and really focusing and sticking to the game plan.
There wasn’t much that needed to be said from Woodson at the halftime break. Indiana returned to the playing floor with five minutes left in the break. For Galloway and the rest of the team, it was a message that they needed to lock in defensively.
“Just more urgency just because we shouldn't go into halftime only up three,” Galloway said. “We got to find ways to fix that. Obviously, we're a better team than that.”
The Indiana defense was fantastic in the second half, providing energy from the first possession forward. After putting on a three-point clinic in the first half, Miami went 7-of-30 (23.3%) from the field and an abysmal 4-of-16 from beyond the arc in the second half. The RedHawks went on a scoreless drought spanning over 6 minutes.
As the defense flourished, the offense capitalized, pushing what was at the time a 5-point lead out to a 16-point difference.
Although they only had three turnovers forced in the second half, Indiana was hounding Miami ball handlers, forcing tough shots late in the shot clock.
Although Friday night’s second half was the best, there are still wrinkles that the Indiana’s defense needs be ironed out. However, a defensive clinic in the second-half may be what the doctor ordered for Indiana as they begin conference play next week.
For someone that is familiar with the Big Ten grind, Galloway knows that it will be a step-by-step process.
“We got to take it one game at a time because every team is a good opponent, and you got to focus on each team.”
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