BLOOMINGTON — Shooting basketballs is a funny thing.
After one of the worst 3-point shooting performances in modern Indiana men’s basketball history, that’s all head coach Mike Woodson could think of.
The Hoosiers escaped on Sunday evening at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall against Winthrop, 77-68. But they did so in spite of an abysmal 1-for-20 clip from 3-point range.
IU went 0 for 9 from 3-point range last season at Illinois. But among its games with a made three, this was its lowest 3-point percentage since at least 2011.
Outside shooting is far from a new issue for this IU team, but this represented a new low.
“They were all good looks. So I can’t sit here and complain that they were bad shots,” Woodson said after the game. “They have just got to keep working, and eventually they will fall.”
Luke Goode and Mackenzie Mgbako accounted for most of the 3-point misses.
Goode sunk IU’s lone triple of the game — on the team’s first attempt. The Hoosiers missed 19 in a row after that, and Goode finished the game 1 for 9. Mgbako couldn’t find the right touch and went 0 for 5 from beyond the arc.
Myles Rice went 0 for 3, Trey Galloway missed his two attempts, and Kanaan Carlyle misfired on his lone 3-point try.
Many of Indiana’s attempts from beyond the arc, like Woodson said, were open looks. Winthrop isn’t a lockdown 3-point defense, by any means — entering Sunday’s game, Eagles opponents shot 35.7 percent from 3-point range, which is a bottom-100 mark in the nation. The Hoosiers just couldn’t knock down those open looks.
It’s hard to know what kind of effect all those misses have on a team’s mentality, and how much it can snowball around the roster when shots aren’t falling. But IU can’t use that as an excuse.
“We’ve just got to get over that mental hurdle and keep shooting,” Rice said. “We’re getting good shots and I feel comfortable with everybody who took threes tonight, and it was really good shots. We’ve just got to hit them.”
There are multiple ways to look at this for the Hoosiers.
They’ve had issues in the past with not setting up enough open looks from beyond the arc, and that’s not the case here. Very few of the 20 threes IU attempted were bad shots, and some of them were wide open. Woodson is correct in thinking that those shots will eventually fall, one way or another.
But poor 3-point shooting, regardless of the shot quality, is a recurring issue for Mike Woodson’s Indiana teams. This group, in particular, does have the shooters to be better than this. And they’ve shown it on several occasions already this year.
But when the shots aren’t falling, the bottom can fall out quickly. Sunday’s numbers are an extreme. But this is the sixth game — out of 13 on the season — when IU has shot under 30 percent from beyond the arc.
If Indiana keeps that up in Big Ten play, it will not lead to pretty results.
But all Woodson can do is trust his players to start knocking down those shots sooner than later.
“You’re always concerned about them (the team’s 3-point shooting),” Woodson said. “We’re shooting them. And again, if they were bad threes, then I would really sit here and complain. But they were good threes, and I feel good about the guys that are shooting them. So again, eventually, they are going to make them. That’s how I think.”
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