Author: Mike Schumann

It’s a well known fact — the Big Ten Conference has not produced an NCAA Tournament champion since Tom Izzo and Michigan State won the crown in 2000 — a 22-year drought. Most pundits will say the league’s futility in March stems from a physical style of play that doesn’t translate to the postseason, and discourages high-end high school talent from even joining a team from the league in the first place. “The league’s greatest challenge has been its ability to recruit NBA-level talent throughout the conference,” ESPN’s Myron Medcalf said last year in a discussion on why the Big…

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 Minnesota.  In his first season as head coach, Ben Johnson led the Gophers to a 13-17 mark overall and a 4-16 record in league play.  Although he is in the midst…

Some of the country’s top college quarterbacks are spending the weekend down in Louisiana, and IU signal caller Connor Bazelak is among them. A transfer from Missouri, Bazelak is one of several quarterbacks selected to serve as a counselor for this year’s Manning Passing Academy. The four-day event, which begins on Thursday and runs through Sunday, is held at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, Louisiana. It serves as one of the country’s premier football camps. The Manning Passing Academy prides itself on helping high school quarterbacks, running backs, receivers and tight ends realize their full potential on and off the…

With Trayce Jackson-Davis and Race Thompson back, and promising 5-star freshman Malik Reneau on board, minutes won’t be easy to come by in Indiana’s frontcourt. Junior forward Jordan Geronimo has waited patiently for his opportunity.  His minutes inched up from 8.1 per contest as a freshman in 2020-21 to 12.6 last season. But an extra year of eligibility meant Thompson could return, and his decision to do so had many wondering if Geronimo would seek an opportunity elsewhere. He did — on the perimeter. Geronimo announced his decision to return to the program in late April, after Thompson’s announcement and…

Former Purdue basketball star Caleb Swanigan has died at the age of 25. WANE 15 reported that Swanigan died of natural causes. Indiana’s Mr. Basketball in 2015, Swanigan elected to stay home and play for the Boilermakers after originally committing to Michigan State.  Swanigan was named the Big Ten Player of the Year and first-team All American after his sophomore season in West Lafayette. Swanigan was drafted 26th overall in 2017 by the Trail Blazers and appeared in 75 games in the NBA. He spent 10 games with the Kings and 65 with the Trail Blazers. He last appeared in the…

Now that Rivals and On3 have joined 247Sports with updated class of 2023 basketball player rankings after the spring, let’s take a look at where all three national outlets place IU’s primary recruiting targets in the rising senior class. With a point guard (Gabe Cupps) and combo guard (Jakai Newton), Indiana is clearly focused on adding the combination of length and outside shooting ability when it comes to rounding out the class with two or three more players. While there is a long way to go, Indiana’s two-man class is currently No. 6 nationally according to the 247Sports Composite rankings.…

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 Michigan State.  The Spartans are coming off a 23-13 season overall including an 11-9 finish in the Big Ten.  They have some key pieces back, but did MSU bring in anyone…

Class of 2024 wing Kanon Catchings got a chance to briefly meet IU head coach Mike Woodson a couple weeks ago at the program’s team camp in Bloomington. He’s coming back this week for an unofficial visit. “He’s cool,” Catchings said of his initial brief impression of Woodson when we caught up with him briefly on Saturday following the IBCA top-100 camp. “I’ll meet him more this week.  I’m excited to get back out there on Wednesday.” Catchings was performing on Saturday at his home school — Brownsburg H.S. in the northwest Indianapolis suburbs.  As a sophomore at Brownsburg, he…

With a sudden end of June decision timeline that arose soon after a Maryland visit, class of 2023 wing Jamie Kaiser looked like a pretty heavy lean to end up with the Terrapins. And that may very well be where he lands. But the end of June timing appears to be no longer, and IU head coach Mike Woodson may have played a role. Woodson made Kaiser a priority on Friday night during the first day of a live recruiting period that allows college coaches to watch players in person.  The Indiana head coach flew out to the Washington D.C.…

If Indiana bounces back in 2022, they will have earned it. In what could be the last year of division play in the Big Ten, the Hoosiers have the most difficult schedule in the conference according to ESPN’s Football Power Index (FPI). ESPN describes the FPI as “a predictive rating system designed to measure team strength and project performance going forward. The ultimate goal of FPI is not to rank teams 1 through 128; rather, it is to correctly predict games and season outcomes. The FPI model ranks IU No. 66 in the country overall and predicts 4.3 wins in…