What opposing coaches have said about Indiana basketball

Everything opposing coaches have said about Indiana basketball after playing against the Hoosiers this season.

Through five games to start the season, Indiana basketball has churned out mixed results across varied levels of competition.

The Hoosiers were expected to win comfortably at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall against Florida Gulf Coast, Army and Wright State, but instead Mike Woodson’s squad had to hold their breath for each of the three single-digit victories.

Then, this past weekend at the Empire Classic, Indiana was served a reality check as it was blown out by No. 5 UConn, 77-57, and barely escaped Louisville, 74-66, at Madison Square Garden.

While wins are ultimately what matter at this stage — IU is 4-1 overall — there’s still plenty that Indiana has to learn about itself before the non-conference schedule heats up and Big Ten play nears.

Peegs.com talked postgame with all five of Indiana’s opposing head coaches this season. Here’s what they had to say about the Hoosiers at this early stage in the campaign.

Kenny Payne (Louisville): “First of all, gotta take my hat off to Indiana. Woody did a great job with his team. He has a good team, very solid, don’t make many mistakes. They didn’t shoot the ball great, but they made adjustments. They picked up the adjustments quick, and it caught us a little bit off guard. We became stagnant offensively. Hats off to them. The big fella, the two big guys really did a good job for them. I don’t know how many points in the paint they had, but it was a lot.”

Dan Hurley (UConn): “It’s just paint, paint, paint for them. The three-point line is not something at this point for them that’s a strength. The strength is their fours and fives, and it’s (Xavier) Johnson and (Trey) Galloway cutting, slashing. We didn’t so a good enough job on Malik (Reneau). Malik’s a hell of a player, man, he’s gonna be just a killer.”

Scott Nagy (Wright State): “One of the things about Indiana, teams are going to shoot more threes against them because it’s hard to get in and around the basket because of (Kel’el) Ware. I mean, he just makes it very difficult. We very, very rarely shoot that many threes (26), but in a game like that we just have to because we can’t score around the basket as easy with (Ware) in there… I think most teams are just going to shoot more threes against Indiana than they do most people just because it’s hard to score around the basket.”

Kevin Kuwik (Army): “I think they have great positional size across the board. I think they execute really well. Obviously, it’s a new team at this time of the year. Coach Woodson’s still fitting his pieces together, but they’re going to be great. They just got to get some game reps under them, I feel.”

Pat Chambers (Florida Gulf Coast): “Xavier Johnson’s one of the better on-ball defenders. It’s great to see him back, I recruited him many, many years ago. I mean, he’s a pest on defense, and so is (Gabe) Cupps… Their length closing out on us really disrupted our rhythm.”