Maintaining success has never been more difficult in college basketball. The combination of the transfer portal and the NBA Draft makes each offseason both eventful and potentially transformative for most programs. Now that the smoke has mostly cleared following the 2021-22 season, we’ll go team-by-team in the Big Ten to assess which programs are set up for success, and who might take a step back. ———— Next up is Northwestern. Head coach Chris Collins has been in Evanston for nine seasons, and he has amassed a 133-150 record during his time there. The Wildcats were 15-16 overall in 2021-22, and…
Author: Mike Schumann
This past week was the first of two live periods in July, when college coaches can watch prospects play travel basketball. How staffs choose to allocate their time during live periods always tells a story. With not many days available, just four staff members allowed on the road, and prospects spread out across the country, if IU basketball was watching a player this past weekend, chances are they are fairly serious about them. That is especially true of IU head coach Mike Woodson, who to this point in his tenure leading the program hasn’t always made it a priority to…
For the second straight season, Kyle Schwarber is an MLB All-Star. After a blistering month of June and early July that saw him take the NL lead with 28 home runs, it was an expected outcome for the former IU slugger. “It’s obviously something that you always want to be,” Schwarber told MLB.com’s Todd Zolecki about making his second consecutive All-Star team. Schwarber is batting .222 with 28 home runs, 57 RBIs and an .867 OPS. He struggled through May 29, batting just .181 with a .699 OPS. But from May 30 through Sunday, Schwarber is batting .269 with 18…
Class of 2023 four-star wing Jamie Kaiser has an official visit planned to Indiana according to a report. This is an update from what Kaiser has told The Daily Hoosier in multiple conversations this summer, as well as recent reporting by other outlets. Previously the message from Kaiser was that he was planning to visit IU, or that he wanted to. But in a report by On3’s Jamie Shaw published on Sunday, Kaiser said he actually has official visits to UCLA and Indiana scheduled. “When we are out in California for Adidas, I am going to go to UCLA because…
For the second time in just over a week, IU has offered a guard in the rising senior class. On Saturday, Fairfax, Va. based 6-foot-4 combo-guard DeShawn Harris-Smith reported an offer from Indiana. The IU staff watched Harris-Smith play this weekend at the Nike EYBL event in Kansas City according to multiple reports. For spring and summer basketball, Harris-Smith plays for Team Takeover on the Nike EYBL Circuit. That’s the same Washington D.C. area program that produced Victor Oladipo and Xavier Johnson. He attends St. Paul VI for high school. That team finished the season 31-5 and won the Washington…
He isn’t big or tall and still looks very young, but none of that is stopping high majors from jumping in on 2025 point guard Mikel Brown, Jr. Indiana was the latest to enter the mix on Friday when they offered Brown after the IU staff had multiple chances to see him live during Adidas 3SSB action in Rock Hill, S.C. Brown is just 5-foot-11 and likely well under 150 pounds, but he already has offers from Seton Hall, Maryland, Florida, Texas A&M, Auburn, and Baylor. He doesn’t appear in the early rankings for 2025, but that should change with…
On a team that returns 78 percent of its minutes from a year ago, there aren’t a ton of clear openings for immediate playing time for newcomers. When he arrived in Bloomington a month ago, freshman forward Kaleb Banks knew what he was up against. “Coming in, I expected us to have a pretty good team. I knew that it was going to be competitive during practices,” Banks said on Thursday. As a high school product in Georgia (Fayette County H.S.), it wasn’t clear what direction Banks would go positionally at the next level. Was he a three or a…
“Two walls of red, with a game in the middle of it. My ears are still ringing.” That’s how ESPN college basketball analyst Jay Bilas recalled the atmosphere at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall in 2017, when he called a game involving his alma mater Duke in Bloomington. Bilas typically makes at least one stop at IU over the course of the college basketball season in connection with a marquee matchup that ESPN picks up. His most recent call at Indiana was when the Hoosiers faced Wisconsin in February. This week Bilas named his top-5 college basketball venues, and with some…
IU basketball class of 2023 commit Gabe Cupps has a connection to LeBron James that started before he entered high school. It began when he played on the North Coast Blue Chips spring and summer travel team with James’ son Bronny in 2018, and continues to this day. James was in Ohio over the weekend for a final reunion of the Blue Chips team, which because of James, drew national attention when a highly talented group of middle-school players played across the country, drawing massive crowds along the way. Cupps drew national fame on the team, and specifically when he…
IU Athletics named its male and female athletes of the year on Wednesday. Below is the full release from the school: ————- Indiana swimming and diving junior Brendan Burns and sophomore Tarrin Gilliland were named the recipients of the IU Athlete of the Year awards for the 2021-22 season in which each won an individual NCAA Championship. “Congratulations to Tarrin and Brendan for their remarkable accomplishments this season and for being selected as our 2021-22 Athletes of the Year,” said IU Vice President and Director of Intercollegiate Athletics Scott Dolson. “Our men’s and women’s swimming and diving programs have produced some…