By Dustin Dow
The Cincinnati Enquirer

INDIANAPOLIS - Bracey Wright has been pretty impressive so far in Indiana University's first two games.

Wright's line of 20.5 points and 7.0 rebounds stand out significantly on the Hoosiers' stat sheet. But those are only one man's stats, which is part of the reason why Indiana enters today's Wooden Tradition game against Xavier coming off a surprising loss to Vanderbilt on Monday. Xavier is trying to recover from a disappointing loss of its own, against Ball State on Tuesday.

Like Xavier (3-1), Indiana has failed to find a fluid offensive attack in the early going, and as a result the Hoosiers are relying heavily on the sophomore Wright, who has scored almost one-third of Indiana's points.

So it's no surprise the preseason Wooden Award nominee will be the focus of Xavier's game plan when the teams tip off at 4 p.m. today. Indiana starts talented individuals at the other four positions, but the Hoosiers' offense starts with the 6-foot-3 Wright, who can pull up from 3-point range, dribble to the hoop or just as easily get to the foul line.

"It's pretty obvious he's one of the best guards in the country," Xavier coach Thad Matta said. "They do a great job of creating space for him. He's a guy that can hurt you in a lot of different ways. I don't think one guy can guard Bracey Wright. We're going to have to have a lot of guys step up and hope he's having an off night."

Wright scored 23 points against UNC Greensboro in the season opener, which prompted Vanderbilt to apply a box-and-one defense on him. Vandy limited him to nine shot attempts from the field and an 18-point night. The rest of the team managed just 42 points, and Indiana shot 32.7 percent in a 13-point loss.

Clearly, Xavier's best opportunity to get out of sold-out, pro-Hoosier Conseco Fieldhouse with a victory is to limit Wright's touches and force the rest of the Indiana team to perform offensively.

Xavier has several swingmen, including Romain Sato, Keith Jackson and Justin Cage, who match up favorably with Wright.

"We're not going to shut him down, because he's a great player," Jackson said. "He's a big part of their offense, but we've got to make him do things he doesn't want to do. If you slow him down, it slows everybody else down, because they're going to go through him."

One-on-one, Wright is difficult to handle, which is why Xavier's team defensive effort will be as important as individual matchups.

If that occurs, it would be in contrast to how Xavier played in losing to Ball State. The Musketeers were disorganized on both ends of the court Tuesday. Players were forced to play out of position, and an overall lack of awareness infected the entire team.

"Against Ball State, that wasn't us," Jackson said. "Execution-wise, we broke so many plays on offense and defense. We were supposed to hedge on defense, and guys were forgetting plays. We had smaller guys in there for most of the game, and a lot of us don't know how to play the 'four' or the 'five.' We just have to focus."

Players and coaches say those issues have been cured by time and practice over the last few days, and there are no lingering effects from the Ball State game. If Xavier doesn't stick to its defensive game plan today, a player of Wright's caliber could hurt the Musketeers potentially even more than did Ball State, which capitalized on the open jump shots Xavier allowed.

"I don't want to say (Ball State) was a wake-up call," Matta said, "but I've got great confidence we'll play better than we did Tuesday night."

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E-mail ddow@enquirer.com