Expect the best from IU

Don't expect anything else. The IU football team is on a two-game Big Ten winning streak after its upset of No. 15 Iowa last Saturday, and hopes are as high as the tide that is sweeping the S.S. IU swiftly across the sea of Big Ten competitors.\nDon't expect anything else but optimism from Captain Hep and his crew, who firmly believe they can win this game. If there were ever a Hoosier team in the past 20 years that can crash the party at Ohio Stadium, it's this year's team -- right at this moment, riding this particular streak. \nOriginally this column was going to contain numerous lengthy examples of spectacular sport upsets -- as a way of indicating how to overcome the impossible. But Bob Dylan has never been more relevant, for the times they are a-changin' in Bloomington. And, at least for the time being, this football team is capable of almost anything -- yes, even beating the big, buckeyed bullies of the Big Ten.\nA simple twist of fate is all the Hoosiers will need to hound their opponents at the Horseshoe this Saturday. OK, I'm lying -- we need a mother of a miracle. But for coach Hep, it's not about marginalizing miracles (he wouldn't acknowledge the Iowa win as an upset). Instead, it is about teamwork, trust and tightrope walking. \n"It's the story about the two-by-four -- if you lay that two-by-four on the ground, we can all walk across it because the risk is not very great," coach Hep said in an Oct. 17 press conference. "But put that two-by-four up about 100 feet in the air. Now who wants to walk across it? The risk is greater when the rewards are higher. That's when you really have to trust yourself, trust your teammates, trust your coaches." \nThis week, the risks and rewards are at their highest for IU. And true to form -- true to a Dylan mantra -- IU has got nothing to lose. Of course, the critics, the downers, still doubt. Some suggest that the devil will have to put on a sweater when hell is that cold. Others have argued that the closest the Hoosiers have come to competing with any No. 1 is when the Princeton Review comes to campus.\nLast season, I wrote a column about the Buckeyes being the schoolyard bullies in the Big Ten playground. The Hoosiers were a newly adopted, small and skinny but capable kid who was no longer willing to be bullied. Well, we were beaten that next day in Bloomington -- six feet under the sandbox. So despite this little engine that could, the S.S. IU, running full steam ahead, there in our sights is still the Titanic of the Big Ten.\nOhio State has won 13 straight games against IU, dating back to 1988. The cream and crimson are also 0-13 overall when facing the No. 1 team in the nation, and before Illinois, IU was 0-16 in Big Ten road games.\nAs coach Hep describes it, this game, this streak and this team are all a story about a two-by-four. \nIt will be about this Hoosier team. This roster of men needs to band together to beat down the bullies. So when this team, right at this moment, riding this particular streak, takes the field against the No. 1 team in the nation, expect its best. \nDon't expect anything else.