NCAA Basketball Report News

Indiana men’s basketball wrapped up its 3-game preseason exhibition slate this past Sunday with a win over Western Kentucky in Evansville.

The Hoosiers beat Butler 96-68 at Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, beat North Carolina 76-58 at Gainbridge Fieldhouse and beat aforementioned Hilltoppers 79-74 at the Ford Center. Wins are nice, for sure, but these of course do not matter.

The games start mattering next week when Indiana welcomes Eastern Illinois on Monday evening at Assembly Hall for the season opener.

Here’s a few notes from those preseason exhibitions:

Indiana is poised to be a top rebounding unit nationally

Darian DeVries went into this past offseason with a clear goal of finding more size up front, something that was lacking in his first roster. He found it in a pair of 7-footers, SMU transfer Samet Yigitoglu at center and Alabama transfer Aiden Sherrell at power forward.

Once he had that, the emphasis turned to rebounding as an identity. Indiana found itself at a disadvantage on the glass throughout Big Ten play and the staff was determined to turn that from a weakness into a strength. The early results are promising.

Through its three exhibition games, Indiana’s offensive rebounding rate ended up being a sky-high 40%. That would’ve been good for third nationally behind Tennessee and Florida last season. Its defensive rebounding rate was also strong at 79%, which would’ve been No. 1 nationally for the 2025-26 season.

Indiana’s going to need that physicality for the long Big Ten slate ahead. It’ll also give its offensive plenty of chances as pieces continue to gel throughout the season.

The transition defense could pose some problems

Part of the thing about being that big is, well, you can be kind of slow. Indiana’s going to have no trouble getting up and down the court in the backcourt but its frontcourt, the strength of its defense, could be lagging behind some.

Butler was able to get out running and make the first half competitive in Hinkle Fieldhouse. North Carolina wanted to, but found itself unable to push the pace as the Tar Heels were largely overwhelmed by the Hoosiers’ physicality.

If an offense can run on Indiana, it’s going to put a lot of pressure on the Hoosier guards to get back and potentially put themselves in a worse position by fouling. Indiana can avoid this by, yes, rebounding well on the offensive end and maintaining efficient scoring.

Indiana’s offense could take time to mesh

One of the primary issues that emerged during Indiana’s exhibition slate was turnovers, with the Hoosiers coming out of those three games with a 17% turnover rate, something DeVries wants to take down to 12% at least.

Indiana’s offense had something of a clear identity entering DeVries’ first season in its 3-point shooting volume. This year’s group is a bit murkier. Indiana will probably lean on its frontcourt more for extra possessions than scoring, unlike the 2-big lineups of years past.

The Hoosiers will look to their backcourt, with Markus Burton and Bryce Lindsay as ballhandlers, for points more than anything. Burton can score from anywhere on the court, Lindsay has proven reliable as a sixth man and the rest of the roster has specialties with Darren Harris as a 3-point specialist and Jaeden Mustaf as a slasher.

There’s going to be games when Burton’s shot isn’t falling or Lindsay isn’t as effective off the bench. That’s when Indiana’s gonna need guys like Harris and Mustaf to be at their best, and vice versa.