TERRE HAUTE — Another day, another Challenge for the Indiana State men’s basketball team.
This time it’s the inaugural Mountain West-Missouri Valley Conference Challenge as ISU plays host to Colorado State tonight at Hulman Center.
The game is the midway point of a punishing stretch in ISU’s schedule. The game against the Rams was wedged into ISU’s four-game Preseason NIT commitment as the Sycamores head to Western Kentucky for games against Coastal Carolina and Western Kentucky on Monday and Tuesday in the NIT’s consolation round.
Add in ISU’s road game at Arkansas State on Nov. 28 and the Sycamores are in the midst of a punishing seven games-in-16 days stretch at four different sites.
ISU coach Kevin McKenna is doing what he can to mitigate the fatigue factor for the Sycamores.
“We’ve tried to back off practice the last few days. We were off Wednesday, and Thursday will be a light day, almost just a walk-through. Friday will be game day,” said McKenna after ISU’s victory over Wisconsin-Milwaukee at LSU on Tuesday.
While McKenna is adjusting the practice schedule accordingly, he isn’t overwhelmingly concerned with fatigue.
“Our guys are pretty resilient, we have good depth, and as long as guys keep producing, we can utilize that depth,” McKenna said.
McKenna has long been a supporter of the MWC-MVC Challenge. The Challenge was announced last season and Missouri Valley and Mountain West teams were paired for the first time this season.
Because of pre-existing scheduling conflicts at schools in both leagues, this season’s MWC-MVC Challenge schedule is haphazard, with games beginning last week [Bradley lost at BYU] and ending in December. In future seasons, both conferences are blocking out a specific time period to make the Challenge more like those between the Big Ten and Atlantic Coast and the Pac 10 and Big 12 Conferences.
“We got into [the Preseason NIT] really late, so we kind of sandwiched this game in there. [The Preseason NIT] is a good tournament to be involved in, but so is the Mountain West Challenge. It’s a great thing for our league, it guarantees us a home game against a quality opponent every other year,” McKenna said.
The matchup brings together two former friendly adversaries. McKenna and Colorado State coach Tim Miles coached against each other at the Division II level earlier in the decade.
“[Miles] is a friend of mine, I used to coach against him in the old North Central Conference [when McKenna was at Nebraska-Omaha and Miles was at then-Division II North Dakota State]. They put in some of our offense there, the spread stuff, he liked it when we ran it against them. They’re running some of it now, not all of it. It’ll be interesting to play against them, they’re kind of up-and-coming like us,” McKenna said.
If 2-1 ISU is to have success against the 2-1 Rams, it must continue its good defensive play and drastically improve its rebounding. ISU held both LSU and Wisconsin-Milwaukee at or under 35 percent shooting on Monday and Tuesday. At the other side of the coin, ISU has been outrebounded by an average margin of 5.3 boards per game so far.
Rebounding is a concern regardless of the foe, but it’s especially disconcerting for ISU considering that Colorado State forward Travis Franklin (7.3 rpg), forward Andy Ogide (6.3) and guard Dorian Green (5.7) have all been effective on the glass in the Rams’ three games so far. By contrast, Carl Richard and Rashad Reed are ISU’s rebounding leaders at 3.7 per game.
“It’s a testament to our guys buying into defense. Now if they can buy into the rebounding part, we’ve got something. We can score some points, we have versatility there, if we can just get rebounding under control that’s when we’ll become a really good team,” McKenna said.
College
Another Challenge for Indiana State as Rams visit Hulman Center
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ISU women looking to end five-game losing streak at Illinois State
Within a few points in the final minutes, Indiana State had chances to win women’s basketball games at Missouri State and Wichita State last weekend.
But the Sycamores lost for the fourth and fifth straight games, also losing freshman Jessica Valley for the season at Wichita State. The promising backcourt player tore the ACL in her right knee and began strengthening exercises this week in order to make plans for surgery. -
ISU Senior Day game to be televised on ESPN
The Missouri Valley Conference announced Thursday that Indiana State’s regular season finale against No. 12-ranked Creighton on Feb. 25 in Hulman Center has been chosen as the MVC’s “wild card” game that will be telecast on either ESPN or ESPN2.
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Hoosiers load up on in-state players
With a 1-11 record in his first season as IU football coach, Kevin Wilson knew there were a lot of holes to fill in terms of personnel.
- Wabash Valley verbal commitments
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It’s on: Sycamores, Bulldogs to play at Hinkle on Feb. 18
How badly did Indiana State want to get Butler as its BracketBusters opponent?
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METRO ROUNDUP: Four from Rose receive weekly honors
Four Rose-Hulman athletes earned Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference weekly honors, the HCAC announced Monday.
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Hoosiers reclaim needed offensive momentum
Indiana hadn’t allowed an opponent to shoot better than 40 percent in three straight games heading into Sunday’s home game against Iowa.
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Sycamores will have to match Aces’ toughness
Indiana State men’s basketball coach Greg Lansing has an enduring respect for the toughness Evansville coach Marty Simmons coaxes out of his Purple Aces.
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WOMEN'S BASKETBALL ROUNDUP: Rose, The Woods post weekend victories
Rose-Hulman relied on a balanced scoring attack and a strong defensive effort to earn a 55-44 women’s basketball victory Saturday over Mount St. Joseph.
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ISU's Stacia Weatherford sets school record in 60-meter hurdles
Indiana State junior Stacia Weatherford set the school record in the women’s 60-meter hurdles, while sophomore Greggmar Swift dominated the action in the men’s 60 hurdles during competition Saturday at the Indiana Relays.
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Rose takes first in Engineer Track and Field Invitational
Rose-Hulman relied on nine event victories, 13 top-two finishes and three school records for a strong performance at the ninth annual Engineer Track and Field Invitational on Saturday.
The men’s squad captured first place honors in a meet that featured two of the nation's top 20 NCAA Division III squads and 12 institutions from seven states. The day’s competition also included 10 meet records. -
Mattox’s 31 not enough for ISU women
Indiana State pulled within 63-57 with a 6-0 run with 8 minutes, 50 seconds remaining Friday night at JQH Arena, but the Sycamores lost 84-70 to host Missouri State in a Missouri Valley Conference women's basketball game.
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Mattox, Sycamores staying positive on road trip to Missouri State, Wichita State
Indiana State seniors Brittany Schoen and Deja Mattox are within striking distance of passing 1,000 points in their women’s basketball careers, and they would join classmate Shannon Thomas in that club. Schoen needs just 16 points, while Mattox is 89 points away.
But Mattox has been on a roll of late, scoring a team-high 15.1 points through ISU’s 4-3 start to Missouri Valley Conference play. -
IU triumphs
When Indiana’s Will Sheehey left the floor after receiving his second technical foul, the Hoosier fans cheered.
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ISU women nipped at buzzer
Creighton sophomore Carli Tritz — blanketed by Indiana State senior Brittany Schoen — had just two points at halftime Friday in Hulman Center.
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ISU needs to find chip on its shoulder
When one looks back at the totality of Indiana State’s 2010-11 men’s basketball season, there’s a recurrent theme that tied together the high points in a 20-14 campaign. A recurrent theme that might give ISU a lifeline in what has been a disappointing 2012 season.
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ISU women look to reverse recent trend vs. Creighton
The Creighton women’s basketball team has won three of their last four games in Hulman Center. While the Bluejays have been one of the winningest programs in the Missouri Valley Conference — with at least 12 league wins in seven of the last nine seasons — the Bluejays’ success in Terre Haute would need to end if the Sycamores want to show that their 4-1 start to league play is not a fluke.
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Hoosiers, Buckeyes meet after suffering upsets
Ohio State standout Jared Sullinger blames himself for the fifth-ranked Buckeyes’ most recent loss.
“There were times in the Illinois game where I just kind of took a break on the defensive end instead of the offensive end and it cost us,” Sullinger said, referring to a 79-74 setback on Tuesday. -
Rose drops pair to Transylvania
Transylvania withstood a second half charge by Rose-Hulman to earn a 60-46 men’s basketball victory in a battle of Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference co-leaders Saturday.
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Bradley shoots down ISU women
The Indiana State women’s basketball team ran into a hot-shooting Bradley team on Saturday afternoon, as the Sycamores dropped a road contest 79-58 inside the Renaissance Coliseum.
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Defense fails ISU again in loss at Southern Illinois
Defense wins championships. So what does lack of defense do?
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ISU women pick up big road win against defending champion Northern Iowa
Brittany Schoen hit a 3-pointer to begin the second half that put Indiana State ahead 36-25. The senior’s shot and ISU’s stingy defense helped the Sycamores pull ahead by as many as 16 in the second half on the way to a 68-62 triumph at Northern Iowa.
Indiana State moved into a tie for first place with a 4-0 record. -
Grueling stretch of MVC schedule continues at SIU
It’s a stretch of the Missouri Valley Conference schedule Allen Iverson would love.
Indiana State’s men’s basketball team travels to Southern Illinois tonight for a rare Friday night game. It is the second of three games ISU — and the rest of the MVC teams — will play in a six-day span.
Included is a Friday-Sunday swing for each league school. All teams will play one home and one road game in those three days. -
IU suffers first loss this season in Assembly Hall
So much for Indiana’s perfect record at Assembly Hall.
Minnesota held off a late rally by the seventh-ranked Hoosiers to win 77-74 on Thursday night, the Golden Gophers’ first win in the Big Ten this season and the first time since 1985 that Minnesota defeated a ranked college basketball team on the road. -
Ivy Tech to host ‘Faces in the Crowd’ political exhibit
Ivy Tech Community College-Wabash Valley welcomes “Faces in the Crowd: Indiana and the Political Process,” a traveling exhibition of the Indiana Historical Society through Feb. 2.
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Theatrical group to perform ‘Bachelor of Death’ murder mystery
Indiana State University will host the Random Acts Murder Mystery/Student Leader Dinner on Feb. 3 at Hulman Memorial Student Union Dede I.
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Yeargin, Odum fight ailment as a pair
Often overlooked, athletic trainers are as much a part of the fabric of a team as the players and coaches are.
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Evansville will test ISU’s toughness
Indiana State’s fall-from-ahead 69-63 loss to Missouri State on Saturday exposed several problems on both the offensive and defensive ends of the floor, but the root cause can be traced back to the lack of a important quality.
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Missouri State takes game from Indiana State in second half
Hulman Center is no longer impregnable. Missouri State’s men’s basketball team stormed the Indiana State parapets in the second half and the Sycamores offered little resistance until it was too late.
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Rose wins twinbill
Playing an afternoon doubleheader inside Hulbert Arena, the Rose women routed Mount St. Joseph 71-40 to post their largest margin of victory since the 2006-07 season when the female Engineers defeated St. Mary-of-the-Woods by 41.
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