Hoosiers hand Kentucky a beatdown

With two starting Hoosier guards on the bench and his brother Joe defending him, freshman guard Jordan Crawford put the IU men’s basketball team on his back and carried it to a 70-51 win against rival Kentucky on Saturday.\nCrawford, playing in his first game since serving a three-game suspension for violating an unspecified team rule, scored 20 points in the 19-point victory, the second double-digit win for the No. 15 Hoosiers against the Wildcats in three years. \n“They whipped us in every aspect and did it with a short-handed team,” Kentucky coach Billy Gillespie said. “I don’t take very well to that, but they whipped us.”\nIU freshman guard Eric Gordon did not play due to a back injury he sustained earlier in the week, and sophomore guard Armon Bassett is serving an indefinite suspension for breaking a team rule. \nCrawford’s 20-point performance, a career-high, comes after a “super” week of practice for the freshman guard, IU coach Kelvin Sampson said after the game. \n“A guy can pout,” Sampson said of Crawford. “You make a mistake, coach disciplines you – you can approach that two ways. But I thought he took his discipline like a man.”\nSampson said Crawford was mature about the punishment and tried to learn as much as he could while sitting on the bench. \nIt showed. \nCrawford shot 5-for-10, was 3-for-5 from behind the arc and led the Hoosier offense at point guard in his first career start. \n“I really prepared for it the past week,” Crawford said. “I knew we were going to have guards out. Coach says when you’re tired, don’t turn it over, just pass.”\nHe outplayed his older brother Joe, a senior guard for the Wildcats, who finished the game with 10 points and two turnovers in 37 minutes. \nCrawford had just three turnovers in the contest. He played the game’s first 39 minutes and was relieved by senior guard Adam Ahlfeld with the game well out of reach.\nCrawford said the team was confident heading into the rivalry game despite key absences. \n“Coach said we’re supposed to win those games,” Crawford said. “That’s what this program’s supposed to do, so we went out there like we wasn’t missing nobody.”\nSampson said on Thursday he realized the Hoosiers would have to play without Gordon, though he still held out hope. \n“Game day, they can be a little like Lazarus, now,” he said. “I’ve seen some on game day rise from the dead. There’s not a game more important than a young man’s health. … He and his parents have a lot more say on that, and the doctors, than I do.”\nGordon is averaging 24.3 points per game to lead the team. \nIU senior forward D.J. White also stepped up for IU. He recorded his fifth consecutive double-double, his sixth consecutive double-digit rebound game and his 10th point of 16 on the night eclipsed \nthe 1,000-point total for his \nIU career.\n“A lot of great players have come through this program, and to be in that club means a lot to me,” White said.\nHe is the 41st player to surpass the 1,000-point plateau and sits two points behind current New York Knicks forward Jared Jeffries, 40th on the all-time list for most points as \na Hoosier.\nThe win is IU’s 23rd consecutive victory at Assembly Hall. The Hoosiers have a week off for finals before they host Western Carolina Dec. 15. Senior guard A.J. Ratliff, who is academically ineligible for the first semester, can play his first game against Western Carolina if his grades allow. \nThe three absences at the guard position forced the team to grow up a little bit, \nSampson said. \n“I thought we played tough,” he said. “That was something we knew we had to do today. We had to grow up and be men. … I don’t know if we were great today, but we were tough. Great might come later, but right now I’ll settle for tough.”