Column: Hoosiers begin final stretch against Gophers

Can you believe there are only four Big Ten regular season games remaining for the Indiana men’s basketball team?

It seems as if it was just yesterday the Hoosiers and the Minnesota Golden Gophers squared off Jan. 12 at Assembly Hall in the Big Ten Network’s highest rated regular season basketball game ever.

With the regular season dwindling, middle-of-the-pack teams are making their final push to prove they are worthy of a NCAA tournament berth, while elite teams are prepping for the stretch run.

When IU and Minnesota first met in January, the Gophers didn’t look like they would be one of those middle-of-the-pack-teams scrambling for W’s at the end of the season.

Minnesota began the year 15-1 and was ranked as high as No. 8 nationally.

But since that unsuccessful trip to Bloomington on Jan. 12, they have lost eight of 11 games, falling out of the national rankings.

The Hoosiers, on the other hand, are the hottest team in college basketball, having earned the No. 1 ranking for the 10th time this season by receiving 64 out of 65 first-place votes.

It’s been a good week in Bloomington, but the problem for any team this year has been staying hot.

When the selection committee reviews Minnesota’s season, it will take the Gophers’ recent struggles against the Big Ten’s best into consideration — making the team from the Twin Cities eager for another win against a ranked foe.

Beating Indiana could be the win that punches Minnesota’s ticket to the NCAA tournament, which is why the Hoosiers need to bring the same intensity they displayed a week ago against Michigan State.

“We’re getting ready to play the top-10 Minnesota,” junior guard Victor Oladipo said. “Minnesota is going to come out and give us 100 percent, so we’ve got to be ready to play at both ends of the floor.”

For IU, that intensity needs to start on the defensive end, because defensive aggressiveness has been the catalyst to offensive success all year.

In Michigan State’s hostile Breslin Center, IU defensively stifled the Spartans from the opening tip-off, which created a confidence the Hoosiers would ride for the rest of the game.

Playing in Williams Arena — more affectionately known as “The Barn” — is never an easy task, but Indiana can rely on the same defensive toughness that carried them through the victory at Michigan State.

“The one thing (Minnesota has) that’s as good as anybody’s is their length,” Head Coach Tom Crean said. “They can really create problems. That’s why we’ve got to be efficient and on the attack the whole night.”

Forwards Trevor Mbakwe and Rodney Williams form a down-low duo that is as formidable as any other pair in the Big Ten.

Mbakwe currently leads the Big Ten with 8.5 rebounds per game, while Williams ranks tied for seventh in the conference in offensive rebounds per game (2.3).

To counter Minnesota’s strength around the basket, the Hoosiers need to work inside-out with a lot of dribble penetration from Kevin “Yogi” Ferrell.

In 14 Big Ten games, Minnesota ranks dead last in the conference in opponents’ 3-point field goal percentage.

If you remember back to the first half of the first meeting between these teams, the Hoosiers took advantage of Minnesota’s poor perimeter defense to the tune of 7-of-11 shooting from 3-point land on their way to a 52-29 halftime lead.

“We were just giving up too many open looks,” Minnesota Coach Tubby Smith said after losing to IU in January. “But a lot of it had to do with the breakdown and penetration and how we got stuck inside, and Yogi did a good job of pitching it back out to open people.”

If Ferrell can create as much action off of dribble penetration as he did in the first meeting with the Gophers’ defense, IU’s shooters will be served open looks all night.

Coming off an entire week off, some shooters could get rusty.

But with only four games remaining in the Big Ten regular season and a regular season title within sight, the Hoosiers should be as sharp as ever.

Prediction: The week of rest reenergizes IU’s batteries and the Hoosiers play focused for 40 minutes.

Hoosiers earn their seventh road victory of the season 81-70.

­— mdnorman@indiana.edu