POSTED AT 12:24 AM ON Nov. 10, 2008 | PRINT | Email | SHARE | COMMENTS (8)

IU coach Bill Lynch appeared angered when asked about his team’s morale after losing its seventh game, ending any hope of going to a bowl.

“We’re going to keep battling, that’s what that morale is,” Lynch said forcibly.

Others who were upset after Saturday’s 55-20 loss to Wisconsin were some of the Hoosiers’ most loyal fans.

One of those fans is Brad Snyder, who went to Saturday’s game. A 1987 graduate with multiple degrees, Snyder said he has been following the Hoosiers for about 30 years.

Snyder disagreed with Lynch’s belief that the team has been battling.

“They were saying all spring, all preseason they were saying, ‘We’re going to compete,’” Snyder said in the tailgating fields, where he and his friends gather nearly every game. “We’re not competing. We don’t compete with MAC teams, we don’t compete with Big Ten teams.”

Saturday’s loss puts the Hoosiers’ record at 3-7, making it impossible for them to finish .500 and qualify for a bowl, a preseason goal.

The blowout was not the first Snyder and other fans have witnessed this season. The 35-point margin of defeat ranks as the third-worst of their season.

“Well, I am disappointed because of all of the build-up,” Snyder said. “Going into the season they were saying, ‘Our team speed is better, our depth is better, our talent is better; this is a Big Ten team.’ I haven’t seen it.”

Gregg Snyder, Brad Snyder’s brother and a ’91 IU graduate, said the team not hanging with its opponents is what was the most frustrating factor for him.

“Them being 3-7 is obviously disappointing, but it’s disheartening and not competing,” Gregg Snyder said. “Three-and-seven and losing close games, that I don’t mind. I mean I hate losing, I’m a competitor, but 3-7 and getting humiliated is just what I don’t like.”

As Lynch left the field with his team Saturday, he was subject to jeers from upset fans. But the put-downs weren’t the first shots at Lynch of the day.

With the Badgers extending their lead in the second half, a group of students wearing paper bags over their heads held up a full-sized bed sheet displaying the words, “Fire Bill Lynch.”

Gregg and Brad Snyder, along with other friends, huddled around a heater in the tailgating fields, said they saw the gesture and didn’t like it.

“Now that’s not right,” said Joel Blakely, who, like Gregg Snyder, graduated in 1991.

But the conversation of the sign did quickly turn toward something Brad Snyder said was missing under Lynch.

He said the current Hoosier team doesn’t have former coach Terry Hoeppner’s ability to motivate and draw excitement from fans.

“He just goaded you into unbiased enthusiasm,” Brad Snyder said. “I mean, you just wanted to believe you were going to win, because he had magic about him.”

In his post-game press conference Saturday, Lynch might not have had a magic about him, but he was firm in his belief that he and his team are not done playing hard this season.

“We’re going to keep playing, and we’re going to keep battling,” he said emphatically. “I keep using that word, and that is exactly what we are going to do.”

The Hoosiers have two more games, both away from Memorial Stadium, before the season ends.

Blakely and Brad Snyder said their group picks out one road game a season to follow their Hoosiers.

They beamed with pride while recalling charging the field at Camp Randall Stadium to high-five Hoosier players after they upset Wisconsin under Antwaan Randle El’s leadership in 2001.

Such excitement is absent this year.

“This is the first time in 30 years,” Brad Snyder said, “we won’t follow them on the road.”