Indiana coach Mike Woodson to return amid lackluster season: Source

By Nicole Auerbach, Brian Hamilton and Greg Rosenstein

Indiana men’s basketball coach Mike Woodson will return next season, according to a person briefed on the decision. The Hoosiers are 16-13 overall and 8-10 in the Big Ten heading into Wednesday’s game against Minnesota.

The Indianapolis Star was the first to report the news.

Indiana hired Woodson in March 2021 to replace Archie Miller. He has compiled a 60-39 record including two NCAA Tournament appearances.

Despite losing two NBA draft picks in Jalen Hood-Schifino and Trayce Jackson-Davis, optimism was high entering this season. Indiana returned key players in Xavier Johnson, Malik Reneau and Trey Galloway, added former 5-star recruit Kel’el Ware as a transfer from Oregon and signed McDonald’s All-American Mackenzie Mgbako. But barring a long run in the Big Ten Tournament, it isn’t expected to make the postseason.

Woodson, 65, was a star player for the Hoosiers under Bob Knight. He ranks fifth all-time in total points and was named 1980 Big Ten Player of the Year. Woodson went on to play 11 seasons in the NBA before joining the coaching ranks for multiple franchises.

Is there any way this is a good call?

As of this very instant, Indiana is barely a top 100 basketball team, according to the ratings at KenPom.com. This means there is — or continues to be — a great chasm between the idea of Indiana and the reality of Indiana. The existential crisis for those who favor candy-stripe warmup pants slogs along, and getting rid of the current head coach wouldn’t end it instantly. The place has tried changing the man in charge twice in the last 13 years. It didn’t help.

Lots of Indiana fans expected it all to get right this year. It was a reasonable hope. It also didn’t happen. So if we assume Indiana administrators felt similarly, then they’d be somewhat hastily approaching another search this March. Even if Woodson seems more and more likely to be an ex-Indiana coach at some point relatively soon, maybe taking another year to fully game out a program reset isn’t the worst thing. If Woodson somehow pulls out of the spiral? Great. If not? You presumably have a deeply considered examination of what will make Indiana really good again and who can pull that off.

The downside is missing out, maybe, on a promising candidate like Florida Atlantic’s Dusty May. But Miller was a masterstroke hire until he wasn’t. There’s always someone else to provide hope, if nothing else. — Brian Hamilton, senior college basketball writer

Can Woodson fix it?

It’s entirely unclear how Woodson expects to win by rolling out teams that can’t shoot 3-pointers. Or won’t, for that matter. Without an overhaul of on-floor strategy and identity, no, the odds of a return to glory are not favorable. Especially in a recruiting footprint where shooters shouldn’t be that hard to find.

For the sake of everyone’s eyeballs, here’s hoping Woodson’s return involves a not-so-subtle nudge to change his approach. At some point, he can’t ignore what the numbers and results are telling him. Right? — Hamilton

Required reading

(Photo: Lucas Peltier / USA Today)