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Thursday, March 28
The Indiana Daily Student

sports football

OPINION: This isn't how it was supposed to be for IU football

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It appeared junior receiver Whop Philyor had stuffed a sword into the heart of Michigan State’s mascot Sparty. Philyor had just zig zagged his way to a 51-yard punt return to give the Hoosiers prime field position with a three point lead with 14:16 left in the game. 

But just two minutes and four seconds of game time later, it was Michigan State — not IU — that found itself celebrating in the endzone.

How did this happen? 

A holding penalty wiped out Philyor’s spectacular return, costing the Hoosiers 59-yards in field position, as they started on their own 11 instead of the Spartans' 30. 

After a quick three and out, a holding penalty against freshman defensive back Tiawan Mullen, who otherwise played a spectacular game, erased a fumble recovery for the Hoosier defense. MSU reclaimed the lead on a swift six play, 71 yard touchdown drive

“That was the game changer,” IU head coach Tom Allen said. “Those are tough. Those decide the outcome.”

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Redshirt freshman quarterback Michael Penix Jr. looks before passing the ball Sept. 28 in Spartan Stadium. IU tied against Michigan State at halftime 14-14. Alex Deryn

This is not the column that was supposed to be written. Instead of 700ish words on how mental mistakes prevented IU from getting its first win in East Lansing, Michigan since 2001, and the biggest victory of the Tom Allen era.

This column should be about redshirt freshman quarterback Michael Penix Jr. dominating what was the top defense in Bill Connelly’s S&P+ defense over the course of the final three quarters of the contest. 

It should be about Penix completing a school record 20 consecutive passes. It should be about the cliché of a freshman growing up in front of our eyes on the road against a top 25 opponent to lead his team to an improbable upset victory.

But yet, here we are. Costly simple mistakes killed IU’s storybook ending. Again.

It wasn’t just the penalties that were back breaking. Sophomore safety Bryant Fitzgerald dropped what would have been a tone setting, walk in the park pick six on the opening drive of the game.

The Hoosiers botched the final two minutes of the first half as well. A poor punt gave Sparty great field position at midfield, and senior quarterback Brain Lewerke took advantage with a touchdown drive. Instead of heading to the locker room tied, the Hoosiers trailed by a touchdown.

Even after Penix led the offense in a MSU penalty aided drive to tie the game with two minutes left, IU couldn’t stay out of its own way. On the first play of the ensuing drive, Mullen tried to run wide to cover senior Spartan receiver Darrell Stewart. After Stewart had a huge start to the game, Mullen locked down the star wideout for much of the final 45 minutes of play. 

But another defensive player read his assignment wrong and was pressing on Stewart instead of guarding the slot receiver on the other side of Lewerke. Not having time to adjust, Mullen had to cover the slot man. Lewerke read the mistake perfectly and nailed Stewart for a gain of 30 yards.

On the next play, Lewerke kept the ball on a read option and headed towards the endzone. However, junior husky Marcelino Ball tracked down the quarterback and brought him down on the Hoosier one yard line.

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Freshman running back Sampson James falls to the ground with the ball Sept. 28 in Spartan Stadium. IU played against Michigan State and lost 31-40. Alex Deryn

While normally making that type of hustle play is praised, IU only had one timeout left, and with just 63 seconds remaining on the clock, the only way for IU could get the ball back with a legitimate chance to win was letting Lewerke score on the run. Instead, MSU killed all but five seconds of clock, sapping any last chance heroics for the IU offense.

While moral victories suck, and everyone from the fanbase to the players to Allen are sick of them, Saturday was a moral victory for IU. Because in spite of everything that went wrong, the Hoosiers were the better team in East Lansing. 

After the penalty on the punt return and the Mullen hold, it was expected for the Hoosiers to fall apart, and possibly not even cover the 14 point spread on the game. Instead, the third youngest squad in the Big Ten battled back behind their freshman quarterback and tied the game. That can’t go unnoticed.

If IU can fix any one of the errors they made on Saturday, they head back to Bloomington with the Brass Spittoon. Instead, the public keeps waiting for Allen’s program to have that #BreakThrough moment.

CORRECTION: In an earlier version of this article, the number of yards lost as a result of a holding penalty during wide receiver Whop Philyor's punt return was incorrectly calculated as 61 yards, rather than 59. The IDS regrets this error.

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