IU coach Tom Crean briefly - as in five minutes - met with the media this afternoon.
He talked about the competitive nature of the practices and how there have been some "great battles" thus far these first few days.
"They are working extremely hard and we are definitely in a very competitive mode right now," Crean said. "We're not stopping practice a lot because somebody can't deal with the intensity of it, and that's progress."
Crean said the top priority is mental toughness and whether or not they are getting tougher each day.
"Part of that is the physical combat, it's the ability to play through fatigue, it's the ability to go from one thing to another," he said. "Right now, we'll clean up the details, we'll clean up the fundamentals, but we need to get a mindset there that's on a daily basis. That's where I think we're moving right now."
The second year coach added that the team will not be running as many plays this year, but instead will be running more off of "concepts, and things of that nature."
Thus far, practices have been more defensive-minded than anything.
"We have not been very offensive driven in practice right now; it's been more about the break and situations like that," he said. "It's been more about transition defense and half court defense and actions of getting the ball moved and things of that nature, not really set plays."
Read below the jump for comments from Verdell Jones and Tom Pritchard
Look for a story by DeAntate Prince in tomorrow's paper about the competitiveness and scrapiness of pratices. Verdell Jones spoke a lot about this and said Devan Dumes coined the term "nasty, scrappy dogs."
"We're not the strongest team on paper, but we're real scrappy," he said.
Among the highlights from Jones' and Pritchard's interviews:
Jones on running less set plays:
"Last year we had to run a lot of sets because didn't have that natural talent. This year we've got like Christian and Watford and Jeremiah (Rivers) this year, who can break your man down and score. It's more open for us."
Jones on some of the improvement among returning players:
"Matt Roth has become a lot more athletic, Devan's taking a big leadership rule, Tijan - his hands are getting better. He's catching it, he's dunking it now. He's looking a lot better. All of us have improved so much since last year."
Pritchard on improved strength and how it will help him this year:
"I've definitely put on a lot of muscle, getting stronger in the weight room. I've been able to do things that I wasn't able to do last year. I think that's really going to translate onto on the court and, you know, move some bigger guys around out there. Being 6-8, there's a lot of 7-footers out there, a lot of bigger guys, and I've got to use my lower body and get them out of the way.
Pritchard on the freshmen:
"All of them have been playing well. I think Bobby's shot has really come a long way since this summer. He's knocking down open shots and Derek Elston, can't say enough about him. He's always on the offensive glass, he's always out there, you know, he's pretty scrappy for a big guy. Christian's been taking it to the rack really strong, Maurice (Creek) has been hitting open shots and Jordy (Hulls)'s really been the tempo guy, he's really running whenever we want to run. Bawa (Muniru)'s just being strong down there, he's learning a couple new things that he's never done before."
Pritchard comparing this year to last year:
"I definitely think the efforts going to be there, just like last year, except a different outcome is going to come out. We're going to get a lot more wins. I know that's what the fans want to see, that's what I want to happen too. I want more wins, so that's what we're going to try to fight for in practice."
Also: here is a link to a column by ESPN.com's Dana O'Neil IU's freshmen.
