3 Takeaways from Indiana’s 87-78 loss to Louisville

Having suffered his first loss as Indiana head coach, Darian DeVries came into the neutral site matchup facing a number of questions that could define his first season at the helm of the Hoosiers. Could he have his group ready for such a consequential game so early? Can this team punch back against somebody other than Marquette or Kansas State? Is this team good?

While the answer to the first question was a resounding “no,” with Indiana falling behind by 16 points before scoring, Indiana absolutely did fight back from such a miserable start. With such a spirited effort over the final 34 minutes of play, the answer to the second is a “yes,” while the third is probably not answerable.

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Coming up empty after such a hard fight that brought Indiana within striking range will not feel good to a group that was court-stormed earlier this week, but it was overall a better performance than Indiana showed earlier ths week.

There are things to fix and build on, following this one, as opposed to an effort Indiana should forget at the Barn on Wednesday.

Here are 3 Takeaways from the loss:

Slow Starts

Indiana lost today’s game before ten minutes of the first half had expired. There’s no way to avoid that, and the fact that Indiana was able to pull within seven to eight points throughout the game only felt like salt in the wound.

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Take away that lopsided start, and those are eight point leads rather than eight point deficits.

This is something that Indiana REALLY has to improve on as the season progresses, but it’s one thing that probably deserves a little more nuance and patience from the fanbase. Among players that see regular minutes for the Hoosiers, only three have played a season of high-major college basketball before.

Coming out of so many years of mediocrity while also witnessing the football program’s meteoric rise to relevance will make this harder to swallow, but there were going to be bumps in the road this season for Indiana, especially with…

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Publish date : 2025-12-06 22:20:00

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