Over his last two games Indiana center Oumar Ballo has been at his best, averaging 21 points, 12.5 rebounds, 2.5 assists, and 2.5 blocks.
A big part of the story has been a greater opportunity.
Ballo has tied or exceeded his highs for minutes and field goal attempts in each of the last two games.
It was hard to see any of this coming as the starting lineups were announced for Indiana’s game against Rutgers on Jan. 2. Things seemed to be going the wrong way for Ballo. After missing IU’s game against Winthrop for undisclosed reasons, he was relegated to coming off the bench against the Scarlet Knights.
Little did anyone know he’d be coming off the bench in just seconds, as Malik Reneau went down with a right knee injury in the first minute of the Rutgers game.
Ballo didn’t just come off the bench, he erupted.
Perhaps he had a point to prove after being benched by his head coach? Maybe he just knew his team needed a lift with Reneau out?
Assistant coach Brian Walsh thinks it’s more about who has been surrounding Ballo on the floor over the last two games.
With Reneau out, Indiana’s go to lineup with Ballo has been guards Myles Rice and Trey Galloway, and forwards Luke Goode and Mackenzie Mgbako. That’s a group who just so happen to be Indiana’s best four 3-point shooters this season.
And with defenses worried about guarding the arc, there’s room to operate for the 7-foot and 265-pound Ballo.
“There’s obviously more space,” Walsh said when radio voice Don Fisher asked about Ballo’s improved production over the last two games.
“It’s harder to double when you have shooters around him than it is when you have your partner to the left or right of him and the floor shrinks a little bit. A lot of credit to coach Woodson and our staff for putting together a great gameplan offensively, and putting him in spots where we can get some top down passes where you can’t get a double fast enough.”
Along with Ballo, Indiana’s performance on both ends of the floor as it relates to the three-point arc has really stood out over the last two games.
Offensively the Hoosiers have made 21-of-50 from deep (42%), and defensively Rutgers and Penn State combined to make just 9-of-42 (21.4%). Not only are there shooters on the floor for IU, but they appear to have a group better equipped to guard the shooters wearing the other uniforms. And in each game, Indiana has made six more threes than the opponent. It’s hard to lose when you do that.
Despite playing a bit smaller without Reneau, rebounding has not suffered since the start of the new year either.
Indiana owns a plus-18 rebounding margin over the last two games, including an impressive 31 offensive boards. There has even been some synergy between the three-point shooting and the improved rebounding. Six made threes have come via offensive rebound kickouts.
The Hoosiers also achieved the most important stat in the last two games, placing a couple wins on the board to move to 3-1 in the Big Ten.
Walsh believes a relatively quiet back half of December, when IU only played two games in two weeks, helped the staff identify and fine tune some weaknesses from the early part of the season.
“The beauty of having a little bit longer of a break between games is you’re able to work on yourself,” Walsh told Fischer. “When you have those long games you self scout and look at areas you need to improve on both sides of the ball, which we did. Once they (the players) were done with finals, the time limits on practice goes away. So we were able to spend a little bit more time watching film with the guys of ourselves and areas when needed to clean up.
“I felt like the past week with our two wins against Rutgers and Penn State, the couple of things we were able to clean up and do, I don’t feel like we could have done back in November and early December.”
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