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How Indiana Hoosiers Fans Lost Perspective This Season

By Jacob Rude

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On Saturday, Tom Crean will likely be facing the biggest game of his career as Indiana Hoosiers’ head coach. After an encouraging start to both the regular season and conference play, the Hoosiers have had the wheels fall completely off, crashing to a 4-7 record over the last 11 games and going from a tournament lock to a team clinging to their March Madness lives.

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Heading into Saturday, the Hoosiers have a home game against Michigan State, the final game of the year, and their final chance in the regular season to make an impression on the selection committee. However, on a personal level for Crean, it could possibly be his last chance to impress his bosses and the fans for a program where he seems to have lost public support. On Tuesday, in a vital game for the Hoosiers’ resume, Assembly Hall was not sold out, nor were they vocal in their support for Crean, expressing the opposite sentiment, as a matter of fact.

Which makes one wonder how we’ve gotten to this point.

Just over six weeks ago, the Hoosiers had America’s attention after routing the Maryland Terrapins to move to 5-1 in the Big Ten and securely in second place behind the Wisconsin Badgers. Since then, everything has been downhill. The Hoosiers have but just four wins, two of those coming against bottom-of-the-league Rutgers. Most recent losses on the road to Northwestern and the home game against Iowa stick out as the worst losses, but it’s been evident throughout the Hoosiers are not the same team.

The stumbling down the stretch has added diesel fuel to the now raging bonfire for Crean to be removed as Hoosier head coach. The fire has been a growing one, starting as an ember in 2013 when the #1 seeded Indiana Hoosiers lost in embarrassing fashion to the Syracuse Orange, evolving to a torch flame following last season tournament-less finish to the year, and climaxing into a large campfire after a tumultuous summer in 2014.

Much to his credit, Crean silenced his detractors with his on-court performance, leading a young Hoosier team to a quick start with a 10-2 record with losses coming only to tournament-bound teams in Eastern Washington and Louisville. Even after some slip-ups against Georgetown and Michigan State, the Hoosiers climaxed with a 15-4 record following their win over the Terrapins. Their falters down the stretch this season see them at 19-11, 9-8 in the Big Ten, and hanging on to their tournament hopes.

It’s a precarious situation for Crean, who still has taken a Hoosiers squad and achieved more than many anticipated they would this season. For most, a tournament berth would have been seen as a success for the Hoosiers during the pre-season. We ourselves predicted just a 9th place finish for this Hoosier squad in October. A win on Saturday would put the Hoosiers at 10-8 and 7th place finish.

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What Hoosier fans have is a loss of perspective (along with an inability to detach themselves from past successes). An appearance this season would be the third time in four years the Hoosiers would be tournament-bound, no small feat for a program that was left on it’s hands and knees after the firing of Kelvin Sampson.

This is a new era with new players and new rules, something many IU fans have trouble accepting. They long for the days when Bob Knight was chucking chairs and raising banners nearly three decades ago. After patiently waiting for Crean to bring the program back from the ashes, they have not afforded him anything resembling patience since.

Despite leading his talented roster in 2012-13 to a regular season Big Ten title in a year where Michigan would reach the Final Four, Ohio State the Elite Eight, Michigan State the Sweet 16, and three other teams went dancing, Crean was criticized for reaching just the Sweet 16 for the second straight year.

After an expected mass exodus of talent that season, fans have again offered little patience as Crean has built a solid base once again with the likes of Yogi Ferrell, James Blackmon Jr., and Troy Williams.

And now, at a time in the season when fans should be rabidly supporting the team and program for a return to the tournament, the stubborn fan base insists on doing their damnedest to try to get the coach fired, going as far as to rain down boos in Assembly Hall on Tuesday in a seemingly must-win game for the Hoosiers during a point in the contest where the Hoosiers were still competing.

The aftermath of the game was more complaining about Crean and less backing a team that desperately needs support. At a time when a fan base should be rallying behind their team, who is in the midst of a collapse and in dire need of all the support they can find, their fan base is too focused on the ill-conceived notion that their coach should be fired for a better option that isn’t available (which is another article in itself).

It’s uncertain what version of the Hoosiers fan base will show on Saturday. Unfortunately, it’ll likely be a version that is misguided, which is a disgrace both for what Crean has done this year and what this team is fighting for.

Next: Big Ten: The Fall of the Penn State Nittany Lions

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