The Green Flags (and Red Flags) From Indiana's First Two Games of 2024-25

Jerod dives into the early-season numbers to highlight several positive trends for Indiana ... and a couple concerning ones that are worth keeping an eye on moving forward.

Credit: Indiana University Athletics

And just like that, 6.5% of Indiana’s regular schedule is complete!

While you never want to overreact to two games against teams that don’t have the physical capabilities to compete with you for 40 minutes, we saw last season how troubling early-season trends can become season-long issues.

So while maintaining a healthy recognition of how small the sample size is, and how much numbers are likely to fluctuate as more games are played, let’s see if we can identify a few reasonable trends to feel good about … as well as a couple of red flags to keep an eye on as the season marches forward.

Green Flag: The results!

We have to start with what matters most: the actual results.

While Indiana’s two wins are neither exceptional nor outstanding given the competition and expectation, they are rock solid — which is a major improvement over last season.

For purposes of comparison, I’ll use the early-season KenPom numbers.

CAVEAT ALERT!!!!

It should be noted that early-season analytics numbers can be very noisy given the inclusion of last season’s data (which rolls out of the calculations sometime in January). This is especially true now with rosters across the country so transient.

For example, last season Indiana opened with Florida Gulf Coast. They were ranked #146 at the time but finished the season ranked #241. Thus, that close-shave victory looked even worse in hindsight.

What it means for this season is that while both of Indiana’s opponents are in the 300s, it’s possible either could end up ranked much higher — and thus make Indiana’s wins more impressive — based on what they do the rest of the season.

Okay, with that annual caveat out of the way, let’s look at the current numbers, fluctuant as they may be:

Indiana placed #39 in this season’s KenPom preseason rankings. By the time the Hoosiers’ first game rolled around, that ranking was #42 (since other teams had played games).

The 19-point win over SIUE was slightly below the analytical expectation, so the Hoosiers dropped to #45. The 35-point drubbing of Eastern Illinois beat the analytical expectation, so the Hoosiers rose to #41 — essentially right back where they started.

That’s perfectly fine, albeit a slight missed opportunity. For example, Illinois opened the season ranked #23 and has now risen to #19 after beating Eastern Illinois by 45 and SIUE by 32.

What makes these first two results encouraging for IU fans is the comparison to last season.

Indiana was ranked #50 when its season-opener tipped. After narrow victories against FGCU and Army, Indiana’s ranking was down to #61. By the time the Harvard game rolled around on November 26th, Indiana had dropped all the way to #80 — a hole the Hoosiers could never pull themselves out of.

I wouldn’t put much stock into the actual numbers or rankings at this point. What matters is the trend.

Last season’s early-season results gave us an early red flag that Indiana might struggle to reach its modest preseason projections. This season’s solid results give us some early evidence that Indiana may be closer to the team everyone expects it to be. And given that most projections for IU are pretty optimistic, that’s a good early-season sign.

We’ll get another result and more data on Saturday against South Carolina … but so far, so good.

Red Flag: Offensive 3-Point Rate

Three-point attempt volume has been an issue for Indiana going back to the Archie Miller days. So the problem isn’t isolated to Mike Woodson’s tenure.

But until Indiana can figure how to utilize the 3-point line more effectively on both ends of the court, there will be a ceiling on how high the Hoosiers can rise.

Last season, we saw disturbing 3-point trends early in the season that carried on through March.

Through the first two games against FGCU and Army, Indiana made a total of eight 3-pointers while shooting just 24. That’s an underwhelming (but passable) percentage of 33.3%, but Indiana only took 27.2% of its shots from beyond the arc.

Those trends persisted, as Indiana finished the season shooting just 32.4% from 3 (255th nationally) while taking 27.8% of its shots from 3-point range (351st nationally). In all, the Hoosiers ranked 355th in the country — seven spots away from dead last — in points produced from the 3-point line.

What made Indiana’s paucity of makes and attempts worse is what the defense looked like. Army and FGCU both hit a whopping 13 3-pointers in each game, while taking 58.5% of their shots from 3. Those outrageous numbers were never going to persist, but the trends did.

While Indiana’s opponents shot just 34.3% from 3 (211th nationally), they took 41.2% of their shots from beyond the arc. This resulted in opponents scoring 34.7% of their points against IU from 3 — or, 13.8% more than Indiana did.

It’s very hard to win basketball games consistently with that gap in 3-point production, even when you’re as dominant down low as Indiana has been under Mike Woodson.

So how are things looking through two games this season?

On the one hand, Indiana is making more 3s — 12 total through two games, up two per game from last season. The percentage is also higher, with IU shooting 35.3% from 3 as opposed to 33.3% last season.

But so far, Indiana’s 3-point rate is only showing marginal improvement. The Hoosiers are still only taking 28.6% of their shots from beyond the arc, which remains near the very bottom of college basketball.

And while the easy counter is to say that the Hoosiers shouldn’t be taking 3s in games where they are making 65.9% of their 2s, the reality is that Indiana won’t have this kind of size and skill advantage in many more games this season.

Last season, Indiana made 62.5% of its 2s in its first two games but finished the season at 53.4%. That number will always go down as the schedule strength normalizes. If Indiana can’t counter with more production from the 3-point line, there will be a hard cap on this team’s offensive efficiency, which is what we have seen through three seasons under Mike Woodson (and four under Archie Miller before that).

The offense will undoubtedly be better than last season’s because of the competence Myles Rice and Trey Galloway bring to the point guard position and the overall talent upgrade on the roster. But if Indiana wants to compete for a Big Ten title, or make a deep tournament run, they will have to start taking (and making) more 3s.

On the other hand, the defense is showing some signs of growth …