Indiana Basketball vs. Minnesota: Game info, preview, and prediction

On Saturday, February 16, Indiana goes on the road to play a crucial game against a Minnesota team that hasn’t won since January.

Minnesota is led by Junior guard Amir Coffey (15.2 PPG) and Senior forward Jordan Murphy (14.7 PPG, 11.9 RPG). The erratic Golden Gophers are capable of either playing high level basketball or absolutely miserable basketball on any given night. They have some quality wins (vs. Iowa, @ Wisconsin) and a few close losses against good teams (vs. Michigan & Wisconsin).  They also have some downright awful losses in the past month, such as a 95-68 doozie versus a bad Illinois team and 79-55 beat down by Michigan State on the 9th of February. Which Minnesota team will Indiana face? It’s hard to say, but regardless of their opponent’s consistency, this matchup statistically favors the Hoosiers.

The Golden Gophers both score (68.3 PPG) and pass the ball (14 APG) fairly well, earning rates worthy of sixth and third in Big Ten conference play respectively. Forward Jordan Murphy is a great player who can put up big time numbers in the points and rebounding columns on the stat sheet.

Minnesota gets the majority of their buckets inside the three point line, attempting the second most two point shots in the Big Ten per game. The reason for this is twofold: they shoot an efficient 50 percent from inside the arc (third in Big Ten play) and are an atrocious three point shooting team, taking the least amount of threes in the conference and hitting a dismal 30 percent of them. This plays favorably for an Indiana team which has been beaten time and time again this season by allowing too many made threes from the opposition.

Minnesota has been a somewhat poor defensive team in conference play though. They allow Big Ten opponents to shoot an average of 46 percent from the field per game and they also send teams to the line nearly 19 times per game on average. The Gophers don’t apply much pressure on defense either, scraping in only five steals per game. Again, these stats bode well for a Hoosier team which is paint dominant on offense and can be constantly hurt by turning it over too much.

Keys to the game

De’ron Davis may have to play a lot of minutes in this game. He’s the best player to match up defensively against Jordan Murphy due to his strength, not to mention his passing ability which helps everyone else on the floor for Indiana.

The Gophers will try to pound the paint, and that’s okay. Indiana defends 2pt attempts effectively as a team. The Hoosiers just can’t afford to let a three point shooter go off this game.

It seems almost as if Indiana spins a roulette wheel before the game and spoon feeds three pointers to whoever the needle lands on. Iowa’s Jordan Bohannon and Northwestern’s Aaron Falzon both turned in outstanding performances from the 3pt line against Indiana despite their status as low PPG scorers (25 and 21 point games despite averaging only 11.1 and 4.7 respectively). Since Minnesota is a terrible shooting team, Indiana doesn’t even need to overplay shooters; they just need to avoid giving another low-tier scorer the game of their career.

Indiana needs to try and push the tempo, not just in this game, but in every game to come. It is clear to see that with the athletes on Indiana’s roster and the struggles they have in the halfcourt setting offensively that pushing the pace is the best option.

This team matchup may be favorable for the Hoosiers, but that won’t mean anything if they can’t put the ball in the hole.

The Hoosiers also need to hit their free throws. If Minnesota continues their statistical trend of giving up high numbers of free throws, then there will be plenty of free points in this game that Indiana cannot afford to turn down.

If they follow this blueprint reasonably well, then there’s no reason Indiana shouldn’t win this game. If not, it will be one of the many games in the loss column of a season once filled with promise.

What you need to know

What? Indiana 13-11 (4-9) at Minnesota 16-9 (6-8)
When? Saturday, February 16 — 2pm EST
Where? Williams Arena — Minneapolis, MN
TV? ESPN2
Radio? Indiana Radio Network, Sirius XM 84
All-Time Series? Indiana leads series 69- 50
Prediction? Indiana 56, Minnesota 48