The “Madison Spike Lee” seems a little quieter Saturday.
He is seated after an alley-oop to freshman center Thomas Bryant. He is hardly even clapping after an explosive IU block.
IU strength and conditioning coach Lyonel Anderson is still as enthusiastic as your average coach on the bench Saturday, but he isn’t nearly the energetic force spectators have come to know him to be.
We’ve come to expect Anderson to be the heart of the IU bench.
He can usually be seen hyping up Hoosiers from his seat. Normally, he is the first person jumping up merely in anticipation of each IU shot. The common trends are Anderson jumping up and down with a dropped jaw and hands up in the air as he screams in celebration or leaping into a squat position across the sideline after a big play.
That was not the case Saturday. The origin of this change may stem from the origin of that nickname, the “Madison Spike Lee.”
This all started Tuesday, when the Hoosiers were playing the Badgers in Madison, Wisconsin. Wisconsin forward Nigel Hayes was putting on a show with 31 points in a defeat of IU.
Then rumors started about Hayes having some extra motivation.
Reports from newspapers covering both schools said Anderson was screaming during Hayes’ free throw attempts and that Hayes had some comments for the strength and conditioning coach after the game.
So when Hayes was asked about his self-described playful banter with the IU bench, he confirmed it was directed toward one member of the IU staff. He said it occurred throughout the whole game.
He called him the “Madison Spike Lee.”
“Usually when Spike Lee talks, bad things happen for his team,” Hayes said, likely in reference to the 1990s battles between the Indiana Pacers and the New York Knicks when famed director Spike Lee’s heckling of Pacers guard Reggie Miller only sparked his play more.
So now it’s Saturday, IU’s first game since the loss to Wisconsin, and Anderson isn’t his energetic self.
Make no mistake, he’s still involved. He’s still cheering and pulling guys in when they come to the bench and talking to them. Before the game, he was still bopping up and down to DLOW’s “Bet You Can’t Do It Like Me” and dancing in the middle of a huddle of players.
During the pregame hype video with the lights dimmed, he still went into the ear of just about every player and whispered a long message. He’s still involved.
But he wasn’t the first one jumping up for an IU shot Saturday. Besides for a few moments of elation, he remained pretty calm.
Crean wasn’t happy to be asked about Anderson’s energy after the game. He didn’t answer whether he had any discussions with Anderson about the Wisconsin game.
He wants to focus on the game, understandably so. He said he isn’t going to monitor Anderson’s energy. He knows that energy is crucial to Anderson’s success.
“If Lyonel’s energy isn’t high someday, then Lyonel Anderson won’t be as good,” Crean said.
When Anderson took the job back in June 2015, he spoke about how it appealed to him that Crean let Je’Ney Jackson — Anderson’s predecessor — be himself.
“That’s why I’m excited,” Anderson said in June. “I’m my own man. Coach Crean allows me to do that. He allows me to let my personality spill out on the guys.”
Tuesday, his personality might have spilled onto the game. It wasn’t some catastrophic thing, and I won’t make it into one. But he didn’t quite seem like himself on the bench Saturday.
Maybe this was an isolated game where he wasn’t as riled up. Maybe he learned a lesson in balance from the Hayes incident. I really don’t know.
I do know when Bryant scored a game-clinching dunk with 27 seconds remaining, Anderson was the one holding players back and calming them down.
Anderson usually takes a seat on the bench with IU players on both sides of him. That way he can talk to players when they come off the floor. He said he joins the team in workouts sometimes, as well.
Anderson is within the energy, and he often brings it. But maybe not Saturday.
