For IU men’s basketball, the last eight minutes have been the difference. In the Hoosiers’ first three Big Ten games of the season, that’s where their production has fallen off, leaving them seemingly gasping for air as they stumble toward the finish line.
The team’s small rotation and reliance on starters to play a lot of minutes have hurt them down the stretch, IU head coach Archie Miller said during a Zoom call Sunday ahead of the team's matchup with the Maryland Terrapins on Monday. Miller said the fatigue has especially affected IU’s defense late in games, limiting its ability to finish off opponents.
“Our rotation has put us in a situation where we aren’t playing a ton of guys,” Miller said. “I think you can see out there we’re playing too many tired guys at times, and that is costing us.”
In IU’s three Big Ten games, no more than six players have played more than 20 minutes in a game, and at least three players have logged 30-plus minutes in each game. Sophomores Trayce Jackson-Davis, Armaan Franklin and senior Al Durham all played 36 minutes against Northwestern.
Miller said he needs to use the bench more going forward, but the nature of having so few nonconference games before Big Ten play began has hurt the development of trust with the freshmen seeing limited game action early in the season.
“We’re going to move forward trying to do a better job of obviously improving our depth,” Miller said. “It’s needed, it’s a must and I think it will help us long term.”
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Miller’s first chance to go deeper into his bench will be Monday against Maryland in Assembly Hall — the first of three games this week for IU.
The Terrapins present a similar challenge for the Hoosiers as they’ve faced in their last two matchups. Maryland has a dynamic backcourt with juniors Aaron Wiggins and Eric Ayala, who control the offense along with senior Darryl Morsell, who won’t be playing after having surgery to repair a facial fracture.
Ayala and Wiggins are averaging 14.8 and 10.4 points per game respectively, and Ayala is shooting over 35% from 3-point range this season.
Similarly to Penn State, Maryland spreads the court with four players on the perimeter who can all shoot and looks to use its speed to create drive and kick opportunities. Last season during its game in Bloomington, Maryland changed its offense, relying heavily on dribble handoffs and weaving players in and out from the perimeter, forcing them to constantly switch and leaving IU in unfavorable matchups.
“They made us guard the dribble and they confused us with exchanges, dribble weaves, handoffs and ball screens,” Miller said. “Maryland is presenting a lot of problems right now for other teams in terms of being able to handle their ball screens, handoffs, and their weaves ... We have a lot of concerns going into the game, such as being able to defend them with the way they are playing.”
Another concern for Miller is sophomore forward Donta Scott. Miller said he believes Scott is one of the most improved players in the country. Scott is Maryland’s second-leading scorer, averaging 13.5 points per game, and has been lethal from beyond the arc shooting 59.4% from 3-point range.
If the Hoosiers are going to string together their second straight Big Ten win and get back to .500 in conference play, they will need their defense to return to the dominant force it was to open the season. If not, IU may have a long game chasing Maryland’s guards around the half-court.
“We have our work cut out for us, and that is really what we have been focused in on,” Miller said.
