Hoosiers ready for action

Last year's exhibition game against IU didn't go so well for Athletes in Action. \nThe Hoosiers jumped out to a 19-0 lead to start the game, and didn't look back, posting a 105-59 shellacking over AIA. \nBut it's tough to blame the exhibition team, considering their November schedule sent them to college campuses all over the country to play back-to-back games, rarely giving them a day off.\nThis year's schedule is more of the same for AIA. Between Nov.3 and Nov.19 they travel to eight states and play in 12 games, 10 of which are paired up back-to-back. \nCase in point: after playing at the University of Alabama last night, they boarded a plane and flew to Bloomington where tonight they meet the Hoosiers at Assembly Hall for their fifth game in sixth days in four states. If they can't get a win, at least they can take a nice vacation with all their frequent flyer miles.\nCoach Mike Davis said preseason exhibition games offer a chance to gauge the team's progress.\n"You hope to get a good test," he said. "That is what this game is for. The thing with teams like AIA is that they play so many games back-to-back that it can really wear on their conditioning after awhile."\nAll of the players on AIA have Division I experience and all but one has played some pro basketball either overseas, in the American Basketball Association or the Continental Basketball Association. One player on their roster, 6 foot-11 inch center Casey Shaw, has seen action in the NBA with the Philadelphia 76ers.\n"They're all good ball players," junior guard AJ Moye said. "They're grown men, they're 25-35 year-old range and they know the game so it's a good test."\nFreshman guard Bracey Wright said Davis has had the Hoosiers working on transition defense to prepare them for tonight's match-up with AIA.\n"They shoot like 30 threes a game," he said. "(Davis) said coming into (Wednesday's) practice that they'll shoot a lot of threes, so we've really got to get back on defense."\nThe Hoosiers have been working on their offensive plays and defensive tactics in scrimmages, but tonight will mark the first time they have an opportunity to test their strategies against a real opponent.\nMoye said they will try to touch on as many aspects of their game as possible.\n"You want to see where you stand offensively and defensively," he said. "The key for us in any game is our defense. We can bring our offense along, like last year our defense was the reason we were in most of the games and towards the end of the year our offense began to click. But it all starts with defense."\nThe Hoosiers have also been working on incorporating the freshmen into their game plan and, after a month of practice, Wright said the team is beginning to gel.\n"With the freshmen coming in, especially since the freshmen are going to play more, everybody's just trying to figure each other out-where everybody likes to be on the floor and where everybody's comfortable," he said.\nThe team will have one more exhibition next Saturday against Nike Elite before their regular season begins at the Maui Invitational Nov.25-27.\nDavis said he is more concerned with consistency in areas such as transition defense and floor spacing than with winning the exhibition games.\n"It's important that we get those fundamentals down early, because the Hawaii games will be a real test," he said.