Another Hopeful Season of Indiana Basketball; We Await in the Throes of Fickle Wizardry

    Yet again I am exposed to the hopes, travails, and in many cases wasted time hacks of watching and rooting for the boys of candy-striped pants and ever-optimistic hardwood Hoosiers. Most of the players have come from other states and countries, outside of the Indiana heartland. Sisley and Burton are the only natives of the beloved homeland, our fair state. The former from Santa Claus (yes, verily), and the latter from Mishawaka. Some of the best names of the south and north.

    Burton may be the answer as the man who moves the ball, and even shoots after deft passing options. Sisley? Showed some promise last year, but not enough. Not like the Hoosier Mullins of UConn.

    

    ASIDE:

    

    UConn. Connecticut Huskies. They are current giants. They win rings, moving beyond the 1980s peak of my Indiana guys. Alas. Bob Knight brought us glory, which has been mostly a fire sale of a backwash since. Practically 40 years of futility. Moses and his wife, and some million other Israelites understand our woes and crushed dreams. Four decades of not entering the Promised Land. We peered into back in the spring of 2002. Mike Davis seemed to be the one to truly inherit the mantle of master chess piece manipulator. But no. Recruiting went sideways and upside down. Sampson cheated, the fool. Not all his fault with new technologies later forgiven. Crean recruited a few good ones, and gave us some aspiring motives, but no, no, no... Miller next? Woodson, Hoosier legend but not a championship winner? Enter DeVries. Rhymes with please. PLEASE. Let us win.

    To be an Indiana basketball fan. Men's basketball. The women garnered our attention and entertainment for a few seasons. Theirs is not the real passion, the real verves, the real or true and false fanatacism.

    Knight only enhanced it, after the 1940s and 1950s brought the university and state greatness and aplomb.

    We look back to the halcyon days of yore. Where have they gone. I am like Hamlet, seeing the ghost of my murdered father (the General, aforementioned Knight, aptly named), and the wanton mother, be it Duke or Florida or the Hoosier-sucking Carolina Tar Heels. That dastardly Uncle, Kentucky, who killed Knight some years, or the next door Louisville Cardinals. They steal your home state bird, and your rings that were yours for plucking. Like the Virginia Cavaliers, Wahoos as it were, you exploited your own Mister Basketball! 

    There is not an end to the suffering. Ophelia righly drowns herself in that beautiful Danish stream. Might have well as been the Wabash, and its banks, far away. Thank you, Hoagy Carmichael. We are delusional in our leather hoop ord stardust memories and reveries.

    But I wax besides myself.

    Who else can bring IU the fame and glory, the buckets and rebounds? Harris, from Duke. He played at Saint Paul the Sixth, of northern Virginia. Many Hoosiers are from the DMV, we shall see. Harris, a guard from Herndon, Fairfax County. We have others from Baltimore and District Heights, closer to Andrews Air Force Base. Clearly a capitol city area of our great nation.

    We have a big Turk, named Samet. A long German, with a Russian name. A seven footer transferring from Alabama, who is of Detroit origins.

    Who knows? Indiana in championship years had players from neighboring states, namely Illinois and Ohio. What of 1940 and 1953? It had to be Indiana itself then. Times change.

    Knight tried a seven foot center in 1984, when we upset Michael Jordan and Sam Perkins. We had some hopes until the taller, better, more skilled Ralph Sampson. Virginia.

    Which reminds me Purdue, and Edey, and the other number one seed historically upset in the first round of the dance. We also had New Castle's Steve Alford.

    Have I listed them all? There is one called Moody. And perhaps Alexis will be the key to grit, hustle, and winning acclaim. Perhaps?

    Go Hoosiers. Butler hung tough, but we must go harder, faster, first.

    Florida, Duke, UConn, Purdue, and perhaps Illonois or Michigan await.

    Michigan. Three rings won since Indiana's Alford? Maybe only two. Either way, much more than the real purveyors of college basketball.

    Indiana needs, wants, craves more.

    You can sense that.

    Blog on.