Jack’s Take: Mike Woodson Running Out of Solutions For Roster That Hasn’t Meshed

The biggest challenge for Mike Woodson in year three coaching Indiana was always going to be getting so many new players to play well together. He added talent but has fallen short in player development and building a roster with complementary pieces.

Jack Ankony | Feb 19, 2024

Jack’s Take: Mike Woodson Running Out of Solutions For Roster That Hasn’t Meshed /

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Indiana Hoosiers

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – Talent goes to waste when a team lacks confidence and cohesion.

Indiana lacks both, and that is the root problem for the 14-11 Hoosiers, who fell to 6-8 in Big Ten play after a 76-72 loss to Northwestern inside a restless Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall. Though Mike Woodson has never beaten Northwestern in three seasons as Indiana’s coach and the Wildcats are having a much better season, the Hoosiers were favored on Sunday. There’s no reason they shouldn’t have won that game. They have some talent; it just doesn’t fit.

Sunday’s loss came with many of the same, season-long issues Indiana hasn’t been able to fix: free throw shooting, rebounding, 3-point shooting and an unreliable bench, just to name a few. Northwestern scored 11 points off 11 Indiana turnovers, in addition to 12 second-chance points stemming from 14 offensive rebounds. Those factors, along with Indiana’s foul trouble, contributed to the Wildcats attempting 12 more field goals and seven more free throws than the Hoosiers.

Those were the statistical reasons Indiana lost, but it didn’t stop there on Sunday and it hasn’t for most of the season. Postgame comments from freshman point guard Gabe Cupps said a lot about the state of this team.

“We shoot a lot of free throws in practice because the coaches and [players] obviously see that that’s something that we can get better at,” Cupps said. “I think it just all comes down to confidence and the mentality you approach the line with. I think it’s much more mental than physical.”

That lack of confidence bleeds into other areas of the game, especially on the offensive end. The Hoosiers scored just 12 points through the first 11 minutes of Sunday’s loss, and they mustered only 12 points from the 17:57 to the 9:06 mark of the second half. They often appear unsure of how to attack a defense and are rarely the aggressor.

Still, Indiana managed to score 72 points, tied for its 13th-most through 25 games, though 12 points were scored in the last 48 seconds when Indiana played the foul game. A 6-for-18 mark from 3-point range is above the Hoosiers’ season average, but that’s a low bar and they missed a few in the second half that could have changed the game.

That shows Indiana is capable of playing well in stretches, yet completely unable to sustain its best play for all 40 minutes. In the big picture, how many games has it achieved that? Home wins against Minnesota and North Alabama, are the only ones that might qualify.

So, what’s the fix, offensively?

"Simple,” Woodson said Sunday. “You watched the same game I did. You got to make shots. We had some good looks and we just didn't knock them down. Nothing scientific about it. We moved the ball well enough to get open shots. You got to step up and make them. It's that simple."

To play well for 40 minutes, it takes depth Indiana doesn’t have. Various injuries to senior point guard Xavier Johnson, who remains out indefinitely with an elbow injury, amplified Indiana’s weak bench that has failed to meet even modest expectations.

Johnson’s injury has also put too much pressure on Cupps and Trey Galloway to carry the load on the perimeter. Cupps, with the help of Kel’el Ware’s hard hedging, forced All-Big Ten guard Boo Buie into a 3-for-14 shooting performance, his second-worst of the season from a percentage standpoint. Northwestern countered that by playing through Ryan Langborg, who torched Indiana for 26 points and six assists and never came off the court.

Though Cupps scored eight points, his second-most all year, his 2.8 points in 22.1 minutes per game with 14 starts shows he’s still not a difference maker offensively. Galloway, who’s had real bright spots this year, is shooting just 28.4% on 3-point attempts and was more effective last year as a complimentary player than a focal point this year.

Even if Indiana had Johnson at full health, it would have benefitted from adding a guard from the transfer portal. After all, Woodson left a scholarship open, and his team doesn't have enough 3-point shooters. Even teams like Purdue, Northwestern and Wisconsin, which returned multiple starting guards, added transfers like Lance Jones, Ryan Langborg and AJ Storr to their backcourts. Each team is better because of it.

That hole in the back court could have been filled through internal development, but bench guards CJ Gunn and Anthony Leal, who’ve played key roles in a few wins, have largely been ineffective. That’s an indictment on Woodson’s player development.

Woodson added talent in the offseason, but it hasn’t resulted in a team that fits or plays well together. His biggest move was landing center Kel’el Ware, who’s averaging 15 points, 9.4 rebounds and has likely played himself into the first round of the 2024 NBA draft. The other one was Mackenzie Mgbako, a five-star recruit formerly committed to Duke who Woodson landed in May, late in the recruiting cycle. He’s coming off a career-high 20-point performance against Northwestern and has vastly improved from the season’s early months.

They combine with Malik Reneau to create a front court that stands 6-foot-8 or taller and can score inside and out. Reneau, Ware and Mgbako, in that order, are Indiana’s top three scorers and arguably its best three players. But despite its height advantage against most teams, Indiana too often has been outrebounded – 10-of-25 games, to be exact, plus 11 games in which the Hoosiers have allowed 10 or more offensive rebounds and a minus-61 offensive rebounding margin for the season.

At times, the offense has moved with quicker pace and better spacing when just two of these three – Ware, Reneau or Mgbako – are on the floor. That raised the question Sunday of whether Woodson would consider playing Mgbako at power forward more frequently.

"Yeah, we can experiment with that a little bit,” Woodson said. “It looked pretty good tonight, but they were small, too. You know, it didn't hurt us. When teams are playing bigger 4s, that can be tougher for Mackenzie as well. Can be tough for the guys that are possibly guarding him too as well. Something to think about."

Indiana has played Mgbako at power forward in 12.8% of lineups in the last five games, including the fourth, sixth and seventh most frequent lineups, according to KenPom. The main dilemma surrounding Woodson’s utilization of Mgbako is that in order to play Mgbako at power forward, Reneau or Ware has to be on the bench. Indiana clearly needs both of them on the court.

Mgbako is not a particularly strong rebounder or interior defender, either, seen through his 4.1 rebounds per game and six total blocks. Playing Reneau or Ware fewer minutes takes away Indiana’s top inside scorer and best rim protector. Woodson playing Mgbako at the four also means he has to play three guards, and we’ve already gone through Indiana’s lack of guard depth and overall talent.

Perhaps the best time to do this would have been when Reneau and Ware were in foul trouble at Purdue and home against Northwestern. Instead, Woodson first looked to Payton Sparks off the bench. His skillset is far more limited than Reneau’s or Ware’s, and so is fellow backup big Anthony Walker's. Those were two of Woodson’s offseason portal additions, and neither has been a game-changer. Woodson has completely stopped playing 6-foot-8 sophomore Kaleb Banks after Indiana’s loss at Wisconsin on Jan. 19, which is another case of player development falling short.

The result is that this disjointed team will miss the NCAA Tournament for the first time in Woodson's three seasons and may not even qualify for the NIT, according to recent projections.

Woodson spoke preseason about the challenge he faced of replacing so much outgoing, veteran talent from last season with three freshmen and three transfers, five of which had two or fewer seasons of college experience and just one with such experience at the power conference level.

With just six games left in the Big Ten regular season, Woodson hasn’t found the right rotations and players haven’t gelled together. Because of the way this roster was built, maybe it was never going to happen. At this point, there are no clear in-season fixes, and Woodson may be out of solutions.

What Woodson can salvage from the final month – what he can build upon heading into next season, too – will be crucial. Keeping this team together, if it hasn’t already begun to break apart, will be a challenge as their preseason goals have vanished.

Woodson was asked last weekend at Purdue how far he thinks his team can come in the remainder of the season, or even stretching into next season, in building the defensive intensity required to stay competitive in stretches where shots aren’t falling.

In the middle of his response, Woodson, who will have the flexibility to add several new players this offseason, couldn’t help but imagine what things might be like next year with a tweaked roster.

“We just got to continue to grow as a team, and we're going to have to add some pieces,” Woodson said Feb. 10. “But the season's not over with guys, we still have seven more games, I believe, to go and anything can happen.”

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