Crean: I’m not discouraged with team

In all his years of basketball, IU coach Tom Crean has never gone through a losing streak quite like the one his Hoosiers are experiencing.

After failing to notch a win in two straight home games, Crean and the Hoosiers (5-13, 0-6) must go back on the road Wednesday with a nine-game losing streak in tow to take on Northwestern (10-7, 2-5).   

Reminiscing about previous years, Crean said the longest losing streak he remembered was five game as an assistant under Michigan State coach Tom Izzo.

“I’m not wishing that on anybody,” Crean said. “But I’m not going to get discouraged with it, either. We’ll come back and get after it.”

But getting after it and ending the streak are two different things. And although they only have a 2-5 record in conference, the Wildcats – usually at the bottom of the Big Ten – have proved more than pesky against some of the upper-echelon teams in the Big Ten.

Northwestern barely lost to Purdue before upsetting ranked Minnesota and shocking then-No. 7 Michigan State in East Lansing, Mich.

Leading Northwestern coach Bill Carmody’s motion offense is junior forward Kevin Coble. Hoosier fans might remember Coble for torching IU last season in Evanston, Ill., for 37 points.

While the 6-foot-8 Coble figures to cause all sorts of matchup problems for IU, junior guard Devan Dumes said he thinks the Xs and Os of the game are secondary to the attitude the team needs to bring to road games.

“It’s a mindset,” Dumes said. “We just got to bring the home crowd with us and just think about it and stay focused down the stretch. That’s all it is.”   

Easier said than done.

The Hoosiers are winless on the road this year, and their last two road games have been over in a hurry. At Illinois, IU fell behind 21-2, and at Ohio State it fell behind 33-10.   

Freshman Broderick Lewis, whom Crean has turned to for some energy off the bench as of late, predicts the tide will turn as long as the team continues to have strong practices.    

“The road games are coming,” Lewis said. “We just got to stay confident within ourselves like we do at home and just keep going hard in practice. When we have a good week of practice, we have a good game, so that’s what we need to keep doing.”

While there are many things IU does need to constantly address in practice, one flaw in particular that has plagued the team on the road has been lazy defense.

Crean said the team needs a “slap the floor” mentality and cannot allow teams to stop the Hoosiers’ momentum. But in IU’s last two road games, the opposition has put on a shooting clinic. Both the Buckeyes and Illini shot better than 50 percent from behind the arc.

Northwestern shoots just 38 percent from 3-point range, and in Evanston, Ill., Crean hopes his team can end both trends of getting lit up for 3 and losing.

“Believe me. We want to win,” Crean said. “But as coaches, we’ve all had big wins. We want these players to experience and see the positive results.”