Indiana welcomed Nebraska, the lowest-rated Big Ten team, into Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall hoping to gain its balance after a rough two-game road trip, but it left the Hall after a 96-90 overtime win with more questions than answers, particularly on defense.
Trayce Jackson-Davis gathered a rebound on the offensive end of the floor and put it back into the basket with just over four minutes remaining in the game. He raced down toward the defensive end, arms clenched at his side, fists balled and screaming in triumph as Indiana took an eight-point lead.
It seemed like Indiana was finally shaking the Cornhuskers after having built an early lead and fought tooth and nail to maintain a semblance of a lead through offensive struggles.
Then Nebraska hit a three-pointer 20 seconds later. Soon, the lead was dwindled to one point by another three-point shot and then eviscerated when Nebraska nailed a three-pointer with one second to go and forced overtime.
Though the Huskers would lose the game, Indiana’s defense couldn’t seal the game at any point of the 96-90 win.
“We can't guard the ball,” Indiana head coach Archie Miller said. “Comparably to how hard we played and what we had to do on Tuesday, we were five steps too slow.”
Miller was referring to Tuesday night’s game in New York City, where Indiana defeated Connecticut, 57-54, in a slugfest that “wasn’t pretty,” Miller said, but was a win. That same sentiment could have been expressed Friday night as well, but Nebraska has struggled against far worse teams and, statistically, is not the same level of competition as Connecticut, who will push for the NCAA Tournament this season.
The clueless mistakes made by the Indiana defense on its home court against the lowest-rated Big Ten team on KenPom.com (No. 158 nationally) has implanted more concern for the defense in the future than the Wisconsin loss by 20 points in Madison and the Connecticut win that left many Husky shooters open.
Backdoor cuts easily caught the Indiana defense off guard, and a better team would have surely converted the shots required to finish those plays. Nebraska often found lanes to the basket and hit open and uncontested three-point shots too.
Even in the overtime period, when Indiana won, 14-8, Nebraska hit two three-point shots to negate two of three Rob Phinisee scores.
“Not at all,” junior forward Justin Smith said when asked whether Indiana was satisfied with its defensive play. “We can't get spread out like that. We can't give up those easy shots, easy threes. We've just got to get a little bit tighter on defense.”
While Miller said his team has proven an ability to play better defensively, the defense has been a problem for Indiana all season, and on Friday, the Hoosiers out-rebounded Nebraska, 54-31, outscored Nebraska by 10 in the paint and hit 27 free throws to Nebraska’s 12, yet they played an overtime period.
Indiana will play many close games this season that will require big plays to be made and different playmakers to emerge on a nightly basis. Friday night called upon Trayce Jackson-Davis and Justin Smith, who both had double-doubles, and Rob Phinisee, who played the entire overtime period and scored seven of his team’s first eight points after regulation.
But at some point, those plays won’t be made, like Tuesday, and the offense won’t be able to be relied upon, like three of the last four games and stretches of Friday night’s game, and if this is the defense that shows up – the defense that allows 61 points to be scored from three guards – the Hoosiers will be in trouble.
“Their guards were as good as any I've seen in a while,” Miller said. “They were absolutely four steps faster than us, and we could not keep them in front all night long and just created a real problem for us. Couldn't get sort of our bearings defensively throughout the course of the game.”
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