IU’s season ended somewhat expectedly to top-seed Notre Dame (33-1) in the second round of the NCAA Tournament on Monday.
The game was much closer than anticipated — the Hoosiers were within two points midway through the third quarter against a team many predict to face No. 1 Connecticut for the national championship.
Nonetheless, IU played its final game of what was a turnaround for IU Coach Teri Moren in her second season. The Hoosiers struggled in her first year, battling to a 15-16 (5-15) mark.
The program appeared to be in possible turmoil after four players, including starting point guard Larryn Brooks, transferred immediately following the season.
That turmoil never materialized. Sophomore guard Tyra Buss and sophomore forward Amanda Cahill, along with an intermittent supporting cast, paced IU to its first unbeaten home season and the second NCAA Tournament win in school history.
“This is what we want to do year in and year out,” Moren said. “This is something that we want to have happen at the end of every Big Ten season, where we’re waiting on Monday night for the selection show waiting to see our seed. You’ve got to get a taste of it first before you know what it’s all about.”
The Hoosiers will now turn to the future, which is expected to include every player from this season besides senior forward Lyndsay Leikem and sophomore guard Jess Walter. Leikem will be graduating early to pursue a career at the FBI in Washington, D.C. Walter announced her decision to transfer Wednesday evening.
That means Moren will return the core of a team that helped her win the Big Ten’s Coach of the Year award. Buss, a first-team All-Big Ten selection, and Cahill, a second-team pick, will have another summer to improve together.
Buss finished her first season playing point guard at the collegiate level. After bringing the ball up during high school, the 5-foot-8 guard played beside Brooks as a freshman. This season, Moren handed Buss the reigns.
It worked — Buss averaged 18.8 points per game, and the Hoosiers were able to out-run teams down the stretch.
“We lost a few kids that decided not to return to Indiana and that went to other places,” Moren said. “So we had other pieces that needed to step up. One of the things we did, and the best decision we made, was to put the ball in Tyra’s hands. We wanted to play faster, and we didn’t do that a year ago. We put it in her hands, and now we’re playing at a pace that suits us, me and our system.”
With the combination of this season’s success and the talent coming back next year, expectations will surely be high for the 2016-17 Hoosiers. Unlike the last preseason, IU will be expected to reach the postseason.
Based on how the Hoosiers reacted to a loss to top-seed Notre Dame, those expectations may have already developed throughout the course of the season. The disappointment was evident in the words of the players following a valiant effort to best one of the nation’s top teams.
“It’s very sad to end your season,” junior guard Karlee McBride said. “We got this far, and we really wanted to go further than this. We really love each other, and we didn’t want the season to end yet, so that is what the tears were mostly about.”
Moren has always spoken of the vision in which she has for the program -- to compete with the best teams in the Big Ten as well as the state of Indiana. The challenge of that, Moren says, is recruiting the best high school players in the state to IU. As the Hoosiers work towards that vision, the Irish are still dominating the recruiting scene within the state borders.
This past season, IU missed out on Indiana’s top five recruits according to ESPN’s rankings. Notre Dame, Purdue, Kentucky and Dayton all have one, while five-star guard Tyasha Harris from Heritage Christian is still uncommitted.
The Hoosiers did sign the sixth-best player in Indiana, Harris’ teammate Darby Foresman. The 6-foot-3 forward is the nation’s No. 66 ranked player by ESPN.
“Let’s be honest, we’re not quite there yet with the recruits,” Moren said. “Especially in the state of Indiana. Notre Dame is a special place. It’s going to be a tremendous challenge moving forward because Notre Dame’s not going anywhere, and they have the tradition we’re searching for and that we’re wanting for our program. It’s always going to be a difficult task to recruit against them.”
Those expectations will become clear as IU prepares for its opening exhibition in early November. There were multiple questions surrounding the team prior to this season. Next season should carry multiple expectations.
“It definitely makes us want to go work harder,” McBride said. “We stuck with the No. 3 team in the country for three quarters, and that definitely should give us the most motivation ever. We’re probably going to take a little time off and then get right back at it.”
