My Two Cents: One Word For Debacle at Iowa? How About 'Unprepared?'

IOWA CITY, Iowa — I've been writing sports for 50 years now, and I've seen a lot. Said a lot, too. Millions and millions of words.

So, yeah, I've got lots of words. Good ones, too. There are plenty of nouns and verbs and adjectives in the vault.

But Indiana basketball has really put me to the test since I came back in Bloomington in 2019 to cover the Hoosiers for Sports Illustrated. They make me use all my words, dirty or otherwise. They frustrate me so much, the last two years of in-over-his-head Archie Miller and now four years of Mike Woodson, one of the greatest players in IU history who has struggled to get this program ''over the hump.''

There have been a few highs — but I'm not wasting any good words on that this morning — and a lot of very ugly lows. Blowout losses force me to come up with a good adjective to describe the mess, and I don't like being repetitive. That's getting hard.

So, just one word to describe the very ugly 85-60 loss to a very average Iowa team on Saturday night on national TV? Just one?

Well, I'll go with ''unprepared.''

That's sure what it looked like to me. This is the 10th time in the Woodson era since it started in 2021 that a Woodson-led team — and I use that term loosely — has lost by 20 points or more. Woodson is 76-44 in his college career here, and 26 of the losse have been by double digits, far more than half.

There are far too many nights where the Hoosiers are uncompetitive. That was certainly the case against the Hawkeyes, despite the Hoosiers rolling into town on a five-game winning streak. It was another blowout loss against an unanked team. Seventeen of those 26 have come against unranked teams in games you'd think the Hoosiers had a chance to win.

Iowa was just a 5.5-point favorite, and they've got issues of their own. They can't guard anybody, which was proven last week when they gave up 116 points in a loss to Wisconsin. They have a good big in Owen Freeman, but he's not thick and he's foul prone, too. Many thought Indiana's Oumar Ballo could dominate him in the block.

And even though Iowa loves to run and hoist threes, everyone in America knows that, too. But Indiana, seemingly, did not. The Hawkeyes picked them apart, made 11 threes and got a dozen easy layups against an Indiana defense that seemed clueless.

Indiana's offense was equally inept. They had 12 first-half turnovers, and Ballo had four of them, almost as if he had never seen a zone defense before. This is former first-team all-Pac-12 center, mind you, and the catch of the transfer portal who been on a nice run the past few weeks.

Point guard Myles Rice was the ONLY Indiana player who did anything in the first half. scoring 11 points. Despite going on a 13-0 run, the Hoosiers were still down 10 at the break. Wings Mackenzie Mgbako (minus-21), Luke Goode (minus-20) and Trey Galloway (minus-19) were all brutal, scoring a combined five points.

It go no better in the second half, when the lead hit 30 at one point. Carver-Hawkeye was rocking, and Iowa players were even laughing at how easy this win was.

And it was.

So why ''unprepared?'' Why do I go there? Because that was blatantly obvous throughout the game — and especially in the first four minutes, when they had six turnovers.

Mike Woodson and his staff had to know that Iowa would play a lot of zone — but they had no answer for it. There was lazy passing, little movement and very few good looks generated for Ballo, or their perimeter shooters, who also have been good lately. Ballo had just 10 points in 24 minutes and Indiana was just 4-for-16 shooting from three.

We've seen this before, of course. Fran McCaffery and Iowa has won five of six against the Hoosiers since Woodson arrived. They once won 90-68 in Bloomington against Woodson's best team in 2023. McCaffery has no respect for Woodson as a coach, and he's shown that in his sideline and postgame demeanor.

But it's not bragging if you have the results. And Iowa has them. And that's why this game was so hard to watch for Indiana fans.

Ballo, for as big and strong as he is, has horrible hands. His three early turnovers — on Indiana's first five possessions — set the tone. He also got lost constantly on the defensive end, with Freeman and others easily driving past him or spinning around him at the rim.

Luke Goode, who's been very good lately, was just 1-for-6 and he got very few clean looks. Galloway played 20 minutes and didn't score a single point, with four turnovers. Mgbako scored just six, and was a complete non-factor for the second straight night. (He was shut out in Indiana's win over USC).

That Iowa arrogance toward Indiana seeped over to the postgame press conference, too. Freeman is still upset that he had to share the Big Ten Freshman of the Year award with Mgbako a year ago, especailly after winning Freshman of the Week nine times. He took a shot at Mgbako after the game

"It was never co-freshman of the year," Freeman said. "I'm just going to make that apparent."

He did.

This was Indiana's first game in a stretch against potential Quad 1 opponents that runs into late February. Eleven in a row, and some of the matrix sites have the Hoosiers as underdogs in all 11.

That's a scary thought.

I absolutely don't think they're going to lose 11 in a row, but Saturday was so hard to watch. And that's what bothered me the most, that they just didn't look ready. Iowa did what it wanted on offense and frustrated the Hoosiers defensively trip after trip. They forced turnovers and easy run-outs over and over.

It was a blowout in every sense of the word.

"When you have 17 points given to them just on us hand-delivering the basketball, you're not going to beat many teams in the Big Ten doing that,'' Woodson said." I thought we played pretty solid in the half-court defense, but when we gave them 26 (fast break) points, they scored 43 (in the first half) and 17 of those came from turnovers. Good teams like Iowa, you're not going to get away with that.

"You have to consistently put yourself in a position where you've got a shot to win a basketball game. We didn't give ourselves a chance today.''

No kidding.

It doesn't get any easier, of course, with Illinois showing up for a home game at Assembly Hall on Tuesday. Then it's road games at Ohio State and Northwestern, and Indiana — which still considers itself an NCAA Tournament team — won't be favored in any of them.

They simply have to be better. They can't lay an egg like they did at Iowa. It was very clear that they were unprepared for Iowa, and that's on Woodson and his staff. Don't ever give all those assistant coaches a pass, either. This is on them just as much for not having these players ready.

Indiana is still unbeaten at home, so they need to beat Illinois on Tuesday. I consider them a top-three Big Ten team, and was stunned that they lost at home to USC on Saturday afternoon. So they're going to come in angry, too.

Will Indiana be angry? Will they play with a sense of urgency?

As I've said often in the past two seasons, I have absolutely no idea. I never know what to expect from this group. My fears were realized Saturday night that Iowa would pick them apart, and they did. McCaffrery one-upped Woodson. Brad Underwod might do the same thing Tuesday.

So we'll wait and see. The sun did indeed come up on Sunday morning, and the season carries on. One loss is just that — one loss.

But Woodson and his staff — and their well-paid players — can't let them pile up.

Related stories on Indiana basketball