No. 13-seeded Indiana women’s basketball fell to No. 5-seeded Ohio State 83-59 on Thursday at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis. And unless the Hoosiers go to the Women’s National Invitation Tournament or Women’s Basketball Invitation Tournament, their season is over.
It was a rollercoaster of a season for Indiana. It started with an 11-1 nonconference record, but an 0-10 beginning to Big Ten play followed.
For Indiana head coach Teri Moren’s young and inexperienced roster, those early conference games were about the process, she said throughout the year. Her squad needed to understand the flow of the Big Ten, and it wasn’t easy with a top-heavy conference schedule; the Hoosiers played six ranked teams in their first 10 Big Ten games.
Their first conference win of the season was against Northwestern on Feb. 1. It helped Indiana gain momentum to end February 6-2 and secure a trip to the Big Ten Tournament, where it recorded a comeback win over Nebraska on Wednesday, and eventually bowed out with a loss to Ohio State.
“This is a group that when you start the season, the Big Ten season, off the way we did, it would have been easy to just kind of throw the towel in,” Moren said postgame. “And we didn't do that.”
While the Hoosiers needed a late-season push to make the Big Ten Tournament, and likely won’t be in the NCAA Tournament field, this season wasn’t for nothing. It was a season of building, growing and learning for Moren’s squad.
Moren has said multiple times this season that the development during the losses, and even the wins, are important for the future — that eventually the learning moments would pay off.
They did late in the season, but their impact goes beyond this year. It goes into next season, when the returning Hoosiers have more experience under their belt.
Senior guards Shay Ciezki and Jerni Kiaku are the only Hoosiers graduating. And while transfer portal departures aren’t set, the Hoosiers who choose to stay with Moren in Bloomington have a season of growth together already.
Indiana is also bringing in the eighth-best recruiting class, according to ESPN. The class’s No. 28 wing Addison Nyemchek headlines the Hoosiers’ current recruits. That’s followed by No. 32 guard Gigi Battle, No. 64 guard Ashlinn James and four-star recruit Zoe Jackson.
Arguably the Hoosiers’ most valuable returning piece is Lenée Beaumont. The redshirt sophomore guard was second for the Hoosiers in scoring with 13.3 points per game in her third season with Indiana.
In her first season, she saw limited minutes as a role player for the Hoosiers. And in the second, Beaumont was sidelined the entire year after knee surgery. Even Moren admitted that Beaumont is more like a freshman than a third-year player.
Her last offseason was marked by recovery. This offseason, she’ll be healthy, and that’s one thing that makes her optimistic for what’s ahead.
“I have a lot of excitement just because I can't wait for a healthy offseason, I can wait to get in the gym,” Beaumont told the Indiana Daily Student postgame. “A lot of things have been exposed, but a lot of things I've grown from, and I'm going to learn from, and I can't wait to just honestly just get to work and have the whole spring, whole summer, whole preseason be healthy, and, you know, be ready to lead this team next year.”
Indiana had two starting freshmen this season: guard Nevaeh Caffey and forward Maya Makalusky. Caffey received the starting nod in the first game of the season and has kept that position since. Makalusky was thrust into the role after the departure of former guard Valentyna Kadlecova in mid-December.
The two developed throughout the season, becoming key contributors for the Hoosiers. Caffey made an impact on the defensive side in particular, as she was typically tagged on opponents’ No. 1 guard option. Makalusky grew into one of Indiana’s biggest offensive threats when she got hot. The Fishers, Indiana, native had nine games this season with 15 points or more.
What Caffey most took away from this season, though, wasn’t the on-court production; it was the resilience Indiana displayed throughout the up and down season.
“I would just say never get down no matter how tough the battle is,” Caffey said. “Because the Big Ten is such a hard conference, so just to stay confident and trust my teammates and my coaches and just push through anything.”
It’s a lesson all the returners can learn from and instill into the incoming freshmen and transfers.
So, while an early end was the result of the Hoosiers’ 2025-26 campaign, there’s more to gain than just the checks in the win and loss columns. Moren and Indiana are building the future, and this season was just one step in that direction.
“I think we've got a really, really bright future,” Moren said. “I'm excited about our incoming kids. I'm excited about the kids I've got that gained great experience here at Indiana. Again, we're going to get this thing back on track, and I'm really looking forward to that.”
Follow reporters Savannah Slone (@savrivers06 and srslone@iu.edu) and Max Schneider (maxschn@iu.edu) and columnist Sean McAvoy (@sean_mc07 and semcavoy@iu.edu) for updates throughout the Indiana women’s basketball season.
