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BLOOMINGTON – An eerie silence fell over Indiana’s Assembly Hall as the final seconds ticked away Saturday.
It was so quiet, you could hear squeaks of the sneakers and Connecticut players yell out instructions. The crowd of 17,392 certainly wasn’t accustomed to seeing this from seventh-ranked Indiana.
IU had its worst shooting performance of the season, falling to the Huskies 68-63. Clearly influenced by Connecticut’s size, IU shot 37.1 percent from the field.
“I wasn’t proud of our effort. That’s the thing that’s disgusting to me,” IU coach Kelvin Sampson said.
The Hoosiers (17-2) saw a number of streaks come to an end: the 13-game winning streak; the 29-game home streak; and Sampson’s perfect record at Assembly Hall (27-0 coming in).
“What bothered me (Saturday), I didn’t see our team grit our teeth,” Sampson said. “We kept trying to come back, but the one thing you notice is when the shots are not going in, that will dissolve (the younger players’) effort a little bit. They have to grow up from that.”
The Huskies (14-5) were without starting shooting guard Jerome Dyson and backup guard Doug Wiggins, who were suspended indefinitely Friday for violation of team rules.
Unfortunately for IU, Connecticut still had Hasheem Thabeet. The 7-foot-3 center had only two blocks, but as Huskies’ coach Jim Calhoun added, Thabeet had “20 detour signs. They went in and they left with the ball without him even blocking a shot.”
Calhoun compared the victory with the Huskies’ 2004 championship run.
“The pride I feel with them and the hugs I gave to them are why athletic competition brings out the things in people that are very special,” he said. “I think back to the national championship game, it’s on that plateau.
“My respect for Indiana, this building, all it represents. This is basketball heaven, and I love every bit of it. To come in here when they have a 17-1 team with some terrific players, they gave everything they had. I was just hoping the clock would malfunction and go quicker.”
All five of the Huskies’ starters reached double figures in scoring. Craig Austrie led the way with 15 points.
Connecticut shot 43 percent from the floor and outscored the Hoosiers in the lane 34-16.
What really got to Sampson was the Hoosiers’ lack of discipline on ball screens.
“The defensive breakdowns that should not be tolerated, are unacceptable,” he said. “We switch most guard-to-guard screens. If a guard screens a guard, we switch. All you have to do is communicate.
“That happened on two or three occasions, and the guy comes out the other side and is wide open.”
The Hoosiers’ offense could never get going.
IU shot 28 percent (8 for 29) from the floor in the first half and trailed 29-24 at halftime.
“Probably for the first time, a couple of us probably played a little selfish, probably took some shots that we hadn’t taken all season,” sophomore guard Armon Bassett said. “Sometimes we didn’t make that extra pass.”
Bassett led the Hoosiers with 18 points, hitting 6 of 8 three-pointers. Jordan Crawford finished with 10 points.
But IU’s top weapons, D.J. White and Eric Gordon, had subpar games.
Given that White still had 13 points and 10 rebounds, that’s saying something. He settled for short jumpers and went 5 for 13 from the floor. Gordon scored 14 points on 5-of-16 shooting.
“I don’t worry about records. All I’m worried about is this team bouncing back, learning from our mistakes, not dwelling on our mistakes or talking about how poorly we (played),” Sampson said.
“We were bad (Saturday). They’ll be other games for us to be great in. This was a game where we just didn’t play very well.”
lpope@jg.net
