On their plane Saturday afternoon and about to depart for Chicago, the IU basketball team suddenly faced a major dilemma.
As you know very well by now, IU football’s 20-7 lead over Penn State had become a 24-20 deficit. And about the time the basketball team was scheduled to takeoff, Fernando Mendoza and the IU offense was set to take the field at Beaver Stadium for their final drive.
While football was orchestrating their plan to forge a dramatic rally against the Nittany Lions, basketball needed a desperation move of their own.
“I think one of our managers may have told the pilot that there was a problem on the runway for about 30 minutes,” IU basketball coach Darian DeVries told Don Fischer Monday evening on their radio show.
The football and basketball plans worked in harmony.
With their phones and laptops open on the plane, the basketball team watched Mendoza find Omar Cooper, Jr. in the back of the end zone for one of the greatest plays in IU football history.
“We were sitting on the plane and it was during the whole last drive when we had the ball. So we got to see the touchdown,” DeVries said.
But the game wasn’t over, and the IU basketball plane was now on the move.
As Indiana’s defense tried to stop Penn State one last time, the basketball team was helpless.
“Now Penn State has the ball and they’re coming back and it’s only like 30 seconds left but now we’re at the end of the runway getting ready to take off,” DeVries said.
“Those last three plays we’re going down the runway, second down, third down, fourth down we’re up in the air.”
There would be no immaculate reception in Pennsylvania this time, but there was an immaculate connection hundreds of miles away in Bloomington.
“We see the ball hit ground and we won the game, and then our Wi-Fi goes out,” DeVries said.
“Do you know how hard that would have been to go through that whole flight to figure out if we had won or lost the game? It was very good timing.”
IU football of course held on for a 27-24 win over Penn State.
And upon arriving in Chicago, the basketball team treated IU fans to a memorable weekend. They defeated Marquette 100-77 the next day.
It was the seemingly rare moment when things went well for both programs — and the basketball team got to experience it all.
For complete coverage of IU basketball, GO HERE.
The Daily Hoosier –“Where Indiana fans assemble when they’re not at Assembly”
- You can follow us on X: @daily_hoosier and find us on Facebook and Instagram
- Seven ways to support completely free IU coverage at no cost to you.
