It's Safe To Say That Indiana Is Back

Indiana is one of the most storied programs in college basketball and Indiana fans pride themself in their basketball team.

The Hoosiers are the 11th winningest program in NCAA division I history with 1,677 victories and they have the most all-time wins in the Big Ten. Indiana's 5 championships are tied with North Carolina for the third most NCAA titles only behind UCLA's 11 championships and Kentucky's 7 titles.

Indiana's 20 Big Ten regular season titles are the second most in Big Ten history only trailing their in-state rival Purdue's 22 regular season conference titles. In a 21 year span from 1973 to 1993, Indiana won 11 regular season conference titles including 4 in a row from 1973 to 1976, which has only been done three other times in the Big Ten's 105 year history when Chicago won four straight Big Ten regular season titles from 1907 to 1910, when Ohio St. won five straight Big Ten regular season championships from 1960 to 1964, and when Michigan St. won four Big Ten regular season titles in a row from 1998 to 2001.

Finally, Bob Knight's 1975-1976 Hoosiers team led by Scott May and Kent Benson that went 32-0 and won the national championship remains the last undefeated team to win the NCAA title.

Therefore, any Hoosiers coach is under a lot of pressure to perform and have Indiana in the national championship picture.

Following the Kelvin Sampson scandal in 2008 when the Indiana coach was forced to resign due to an NCAA investigation involving impermissible phone calls made by Sampson and an assistant coach to recruits, the Indiana program was under a black cloud.

When Tom Cream was hired as the next Indiana head coach in 2008, not only did he have the pressure of trying to live up to his 10 year contract, which made him one of the highest paid college basketball coaches, but he also had the responsibility of restoring the Hoosiers program, a program that had never previously been involved in any NCAA scandal.

Hoosiers fans expected Crean to turn Indiana around right away but that was way too ambitious of a wish. Crean's first three seasons with the Hoosiers were horrible to say the least. He was 28-66 and 8-46 in the Big Ten in his first three dismal years with Indiana.

Crean's 6-25 season and 1-17 record in the Big Ten in 2008-2009 was the Hoosiers worst ever performance in the Big Ten. Their last place finish in the Big Ten that season was their first last place finish since the 1969-1970 season.

The Hoosiers last place finish in the Big Ten in the 2010-2011 season was their second Big Ten last place finish in three years, while Indiana had just three Big Ten last place finishes in their previous 84 years in the league.

Despite the fact that Crean stressed patience with the Indiana faithful, many Hoosiers fans began to call for his job. They were unhappy with Indiana's lack of success in Crean's first three seasons and they wanted to win now. Those Indiana fans that put Crean on the hot seat have backed way off now as Crean has returned Indiana to national prominence.

Indiana's success in 2011 began even before they took the floor for their first game against Stony Brook at Assembly Hall on November 11th. It began when highly touted recruit Cody Zeller (number 14 on the ESPNU 100) committed to Indiana. The 6'11 power forward from Washington High School in Indiana, who was the 2011 Indiana Mr. Basketball, decided to attend Indiana instead of go and play for two-time reigning national runner-up Butler or join his brother Tyler Zeller at North Carolina. It was a huge victory for Crean and Zeller has been better than expected. Zeller leads Indiana in scoring at 14.5 per game, rebounding at 6.5 per game, blocks at 1.5 per game, and field goal percentage (amongst players who have taken at least 5 field goal attempts) at 65.6 percent. Zeller is the front runner to win the Big Ten Freshman of the Year Award and he is in the discussion for the Freshman of the Year Award along with Duke's Austin Rivers and Kentucky's Anthony Davis and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist.

Despite their 8-0 start with victories over Butler and NCST on the road, Indiana's true return into the national stage began after their monster victory over #1 Kentucky 73-72 in Bloomington that shocked the world. After critical free throw misses by Anthony Davis and Doron Lamb down the stretch for the Wildcats, Christian Watford hit a buzzer beating three point jump shot for the Hoosiers to knock off Kentucky and send shock waves through college basketball that Indiana is back. Longtime Indiana fan Roger Tobias said, "I've been coming to game since 1954 and I've never seen anything like this. Never. I can't tell you what it means. It's just. It's just... wow. Finally. We've been waiting for this for a long time." It was Indiana's first victory over a number 1 team since they beat Duke 74-73 in the 2002 Sweet 16.

The Hoosiers started out 12-0 for just the fourth time in school history and the first time since Bob Knight's undefeated season in 1975-1976. Despite a loss to Michigan St. in a crazy up and down game, the Hoosiers would quickly recover.

Indiana pulled off another huge victory by beating #2 Ohio St. at home in Bloomington 74-70. All of the Hoosiers starters were in double figures and they shot nearly 46 percent from the floor. Indiana became the 5th team in the past 10 season to knock off both the number 1 and number 2 ranked teams in the same season.

Indiana beat #13 Michigan in Bloomington 73-71 making the Wolverines the third top 15 ranked team to fall to the Hoosiers at Assembly Hall. The matchup was so highly anticipated because it was the first meeting between the squads with both ranked in the top 15 since 1994. Fortunately for the Hoosiers, Christian Watford was 8 for 11 from the field and had 25 points, while Cody Zeller was 8 for 10 from the field and had 18 points to help Indiana knock off Michigan.

Currently, Indiana is ranked #12, their highest ranking since they were the preseason #8 in 2007 and things are only going to get better for the Hoosiers, if that is even possible. Not only are the Hoosiers going to continue to have a great season this year, but they are going to have many more to come. Tom Crean is bringing in a top 10 recruiting class next season highlighted by three top 58 ESPNU 100 recruits. Hoosiers fans can't wait for point guard Yogi Ferrell along with forwards Hanner Mosquera-Perea and Jeremy Hollowell, who are all from Indiana, to arrive on campus. It's safe to say that Indiana is back and that they are going to be back for a while.