Yes, No. 4 Indiana women’s basketball lost to Michigan State on Thursday and broke its impressive undefeated streak. No, the sky is not falling. In fact, the Spartans’ 83-78 victory was exactly what the Hoosiers needed: a reality check.
No one has to tell coach Teri Moren what life is like in the Big Ten. It’s gritty, painful, chaotic and fraught with emotion. All of that was on full display in the Breslin Center in East Lansing, Michigan. Maybe Indiana had a little bit of a post-holiday hangover, but they simply looked unprepared.
The pace was frantic from the jump, and Indiana didn’t appear to have the energy needed to keep up.
The Spartans, on the other hand, dispatched a series of early punches that ultimately knocked the Hoosiers down for good. Throughout this young season, Indiana’s greatest strength has arguably been its effort. Without graduate guard Grace Berger, hustle and pure desire have not merely been supplementary to the 12-game unbeaten streak, but the primary reason for it.
On Thursday, it was those sporting green and white diving for loose balls, taking charges and closing out with a purpose. Senior forward Mackenzie Holmes’ scored a career-high 32 points, and another 17 from freshman guard Yarden Garzon were enough to spark a promising comeback. Still, when the Hoosiers had a glimmer of hope to pull away the win, self-inflicted wounds hampered the resurgence.
With 23 seconds left in the game, down just three points, Indiana had a legitimate shot to tie the game. But, senior guard Sara Scalia, who turned in an overall lackluster performance, traveled and all but sealed the Spartans’ win. Scalia, who has struggled for a somewhat extended period now, played with a notable lack of confidence.
From a frustrating charge call to an airballed open three, her hands gestured to the sky on multiple occasions.
She was completely neutralized on the perimeter and passed up more than a couple open looks. With 2-6 shooting from inside the arc and zero makes on three attempts from deep, Moren didn’t exactly offer a glowing report of the Minnesota transfer.
“We need more out of Sara Scalia. There’s no doubt,” Moren said after the game. “We have all kinds of quick hits for Sara, but right now (she) needs to have confidence in shooting the ball.”
Turnovers, as they have been a few times this season, were the Hoosiers’ Achilles’ heel. Michigan State unleashed a ferocious full-court press that often forced errant passes. Even in half-court sets, Indiana was far too predictable. With a whopping 21 turnovers for the Cream and Crimson, sloppiness was the game’s deciding factor.
Lucky for me, Moren inadvertently aided a little bit in the writing of this article.
“They had 28 points off our turnovers. That’s the storyline right there. 28 points off our turnovers,” Moren said.
Look, if you’re an Indiana fan, this loss could conceivably be brushed off like a feather. You’ve endured more than enough torment for this to cause an issue. And I’m not saying that it has drastic implications for the future, because it probably doesn’t. The Hoosiers still shot 58% from the floor, 76% from the free-throw line and notched 48 points inside the paint.
Is this the team we’ll begin to see every game without Berger? Maybe. But remember the team’s energy and electric shooting in the win over North Carolina? There’s no reason to believe that can’t be the team that hosts Nebraska on New Year’s Day. I understand conference play is a different, puzzling beast, but we know the potential of the group.
It’s early. This was the last game of 2022, and one of the first in a long Big Ten road ahead to tournament play. How I see it, there’s two paths the Hoosiers can go down after the loss: Either they shake it off and return to the form they had just weeks ago, or they let this potentially meaningless late December result define them.
If I was a betting man, I would wager the former is more likely. So, feel free to hit the panic button and be irrational or stay calm and understand the bigger picture. The choice is yours.
