The Hoosiers Over-rated; Officials Screwing Up?

Well, it looks like winning on the road in the Big 10 is going to be a tough job again this year.

Last night Indiana had trouble with Michigan State at the Breslin Student Event Center and lost 87-73. Maurice Ager and Paul Davis returned to their true form scoring 28 and 23 points, respectively.

Now if the ESPN/Coaches Poll follows the same formula they did last week, MSU should jump up seven spots and the Hoosiers should fall seven.

It is ridiculous to think that Indiana should have gotten that ranking. I know rankings are meaningless, blah, blah, blah, but they still are the only “objective” measure in college athletics. If team a, who is unranked, beats team b who happens to be in the top 25, it’s a huge deal. ESPN goes nuts. So rankings do mean something…sort of.

The Spartans now have played five top ten teams and are 3-2 against them. The game versus the Hoosiers was the first game the Spartans played at home against a top ten team. It was Indiana’s first game on the road against a ranked opponent. If the Hoosiers had won, then I would have had to say I was wrong about my frustration over last week’s rankings. Turns out I was right: Indiana was over-hyped and over-rated.
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Now we’ll see about Ohio State. They match-up very well against the Spartans. Terrance Dials is the best big in the Big 10 and the Buckeyes can shoot the three. Under Thad Matta, OSU plays solid defense and puts a lot of pressure on the ball-handlers. I think OSU will beat the Spartans (84-69), but that doesn’t let them off the hook. They still need to win on the road.
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Wisconsin barely survived a game at Minnesota in which the Gophers started the game 1-20. That’s right 1-20! The Badgers improved to 3-0 in the Big Ten with a narrow 64-62 win on Tuesday night.

This was a great example of what happens when teams play Michigan State. How, you might be wondering, since this game didn’t have anything to do with the Spartans?

Let me explain.

When State played Illinois, Dee Brown lit up the Spartans for 34 points. At Iowa two days later, he scored six points. Three days later, Kammron Taylor dropped 27 on MSU. Then at Minnesota, Taylor only managed eight points and had seven turnovers.

So teams give it their best against Michigan State. Last night Marco Killingsworth had 27 in a losing cause. I wonder what he will do against Illinois later this week. If he follows the trend so far, he won’t reach double figures.
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Last year road teams were 31-57 in the Big Ten. Not very good. I recently complained about the foul shoots in the Wisconsin/MSU game. Alando Tucker was 6-17 from the free throw line, while MSU (as a team) was 11-15. Wisconsin was 14-30 overall from the charity stripe. Last night the Spartans, this time at home, made twice as many free throws as the Hosiers took, 22-24 to 8-11.

I don’t like discrepancies like these. It made me think. Is this a product of the officials favoring the home team, or the home playing more aggressive and getting to the line more frequently? Certainly MSU was the more timid team against Wisconsin, so some free-throw discrepancy should have been seen. However, last night, the Hoosiers were aggressive offensively, but tended to settle for outside jump shots in the second half. I don’t like to see any team, even if it is MSU; make twice as many free throws as the other team shoots.
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Picks for Big Ten games this weekend:
1. Iowa at Penn State – Iowa 76 PSU 59
2. Northwestern at Wisconsin – Wisconsin 64 Northwestern 51
3. Michigan at Illinois – Michigan 62 Illinois 58
4. Minnesota at Purdue – Purdue 63 Minnesota 55
5. Michigan State at Ohio State – OSU 84 MSU 69