Saturday, February 19, 2000
Indiana restoring Big Ten glory
After down years, Hoosiers lead title hunt
BY SCOTT MacGREGOR
The Cincinnati Enquirer
In recent years, the Big Ten has been a playground without its favorite bully. While everyone else was grabbing some share of the glory, the big, red giant appeared to be dying.
Purdue and Minnesota went deep into the NCAA Tournament, Ohio State resurrected itself with an amazing turnaround, and even Illinois earned a piece of the conference title one year. And for the last three seasons, the Big Ten has been Michigan State's personal domain.
The bully, dressed in a red sweater, sat back and watched as everyone claimed the game had passed him by. But who's laughing now? Bob Knight's Indiana Hoosiers are back. They control their own destiny in the Big Ten — and could capture their first conference championship since 1992-93 if
they win their five remaining league games.
The march to the finish begins at 6:30p.m. today when the 10th-ranked Hoosiers (18-4, 8-3 Big Ten) play host to No.7 Ohio State (17-5, 8-3) at Assembly Hall in Bloomington, Ind. After that come Illinois, Michigan State and Purdue — the league's other top teams — and the finale against Wisconsin.
If they win out, the Hoosiers will own the conference title for the first time in seven years.
“This is what I expected when I came here,” said guard Michael Lewis, a senior from Jasper, Ind. who leads the Big Ten with an average of 5.3 assists a game. “I expected to be in a position where we control what happens. That's what I grew up watching, and that's what I wanted to be a part of.”
Indiana is a game behind league leader Michigan State (19-6, 9-2), tied for second with Ohio State and Purdue. This is also a crucial game for the Buckeyes, who lost at Michigan State on Tuesday.
There should be some great matchups: assist wizards Scoonie Penn and Lewis at the point, OSU's Michael Redd (who has averaged 28 points in five career games against IU) vs. the Hoosiers' A.J. Guyton (the Big Ten's leading scorer at 20.5 ppg), the Buckeyes' 6-foot-11 Ken Johnson vs. IU's 6-10 Kirk Haston in the middle.
But if Ohio State's turnaround was the story in the Big Ten a year ago, this year's story belongs to Indiana.
After finishing 23-11 last season — just 9-7 in the league — it appeared the program was left with a huge hole when forward Luke Recker, the Hoosiers' leading scorer at 16.5 points a game, decided to transfer, first to Arizona, then to Iowa.
Recker's departure followed that of center Jason Collier a year earlier, and the reason seemed to be Knight's temperament. And as Indiana endured a string of first- and second-round exits from the NCAA Tournament the last five years — last reaching the Final Four in 1992 — many observers were openly wondering if it was time for Knight to leave.
This season grew even stranger when Knight was involved in a hunting accident with a friend, then in a bitter rivalry with former player Steve Alford, now coach at Iowa. Again, Knight's personality, not his team's performance, was taking the spotlight.
But the Hoosiers overcame the controversy by playing good basketball, their best since the Calbert Cheaney days in the early 1990s. The charge has been spearheaded by Guy ton, a 6-1 senior who may be the conference's most dangerous shooter. Illinois guard Sergio McClain, who grew up with Guyton in Peoria, Ill., calls him “the silent assassin.” Last year Guyton averaged 16 points, just below Recker, and after IU's Big Ten Tournament loss talked about needing more shots to be productive. He has gotten them this year and has been deadly.
“I've just been letting the game come to me and wait and I'll have my opportunity to score,” said Guyton, who needs 20 points to reach the 2,000-point mark for his career. “I think that's been the most improved part of the game.”
Haston also has emerged as a force, ranking sixth in the Big Ten in scoring (16.3 points), second in rebounding (9.0) and third in shooting (.493).
The Hoosiers know what's on the line beginning tonight — not just their personal pride, but restoring some of the luster to the IU basketball legend.
“It would mean a lot. You want to leave here with some type of title under your belt, or something that has to do with winning,” Guyton said. “It's something we all look forward to, and we control it, and it's up to us whether or not we win.”
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