It's official: all 25 members of IU's recruiting class are enrolled and signed. I'll take a closer look at the class later, but for now, here is a very nice summary from the official IU site.

It's still short of 8:30 a.m., but 16 members of IU's 25-man recruiting class are now signed or enrolled. Rivals is updating quickly, and Kevin Wilson's Twitter feed is breaking the news.

UPDATE (10:32 A.M.): 24 of 25 recruits are now in the bag. The only exception is quarterback Nathan Sudfeld, but at this point I'll assume that is because it's only 7:32 a.m. in Sudfeld's hometown of Modesto, California.

Football coverage has been sparse in recent weeks. The disappointment from the 1-11/0-8 season, the surprising success of the basketball team, and a finite number of hours in the week have conspired against me. Still, in essence, the 2012 season begins tomorrow morning when national letters of intent begin drifting in to various football offices around the country. Spring practice won't be far behind.

First, however, it's worth taking a look at the changes to the IU staff. Offensive coordinator Rod Smith, who was available last year because he lost his job when Michigan fired Rich Rodriquez, left IU to rejoin Rodriguez at Arizona. In a fairly unusual coincidence, IU has hired Seth Littrell, who was Smith's predecessor at Arizona and who lost his job with the purge of Mike Stoops and his staff in Tucson. Littrell spent 2011 as the offensive coordinator and 2010 as the co-offensive coordinator. Although Littrell is on the career rebound, his offenses were not Arizona's problem: in 2011, the Wildcats ranked #16 in FBS in total offense, #30 in scoring offense, and #3 in passing offense. In 2010, Arizona ranked #24 in total offense, #53 in scoring offense, and #8 in passing offense. Last year, Smith and wide receivers coach Kevin Johns were co-offensive coordinators; this season, Littrell will be the sole offensive coordinator, although Johns retains the title of "assistant offensive coordinator."

Continue reading this post »

Continue reading this post »

One of the few happy story lines of Indiana 1-11 2011 football season was the emergence of true freshman quarterback Tre Roberson. Roberson ended up on the field because of injuries to Dusty Kiel and Edward Wright-Baker, but Roberson held the job even when the other two QBs were healthy. Now, Zach Osterman of Inside Indiana reports that Kiel will leave the program. This isn't a huge surprise. Kiel's brother Gunner Kiel decommitted from IU in October and eventually committed to LSU. In addition to Roberson's emergence, a junior college quarterback, Cameron Coffman, recently enrolled at IU and will have three years of eligibility remaining (and could redshirt as well).

Continue reading this post »

Until a couple of weeks ago, I had forgotten about this old post, which I wrote in 2007, a few days before IU's most recent bowl appearance, the 2007 loss to Oklahoma State in the Insight Bowl in Tempe, Arizona. While people fondly remember IU's last-minute win over Purdue to guarantee a winning record and a bowl bid (I remember it less fondly because we blew a 24-3 lead before the game-winning field goal), it's easy to forget the disappointment of blowing a win the week before at Northwestern. IU had guaranteed itself conditional bowl eligibility with 6 wins, but whether 6 or even 7 wins would get IU into a Big Ten bowl tie-in, or even worse, whether IU would end up in the Motor City Bowl, was in doubt before the Bucket game. Ultimately, the Purdue win combined with other fortuitous circumstances (Iowa dropping to 6-6 with a season-ending loss to Western Michigan, meaning the Hawkeyes couldn't be selected over IU; the Rose Bowl reaching deep into the pool of BCS-eligible teams to select Illinois to preserve the Big Ten-Pac 10 matchup) led IU to a warm-weather destination for its first bowl appearance in 14 seasons. Purdue ended up in Detroit playing Central Michigan in a rematch of a regular season game. Purdue won on a late field goal. The Motor City Bowl is now the Little Caesar's Pizza Bowl, but even Purdue doesn't deserve this fate. Here is a repost of my previous objections.

Continue reading this post »

Well, here it is. Discussion and ballot below:

Continue reading this post »

IU turned in one of its better efforts of the 2011 season, but it wasn't enough to keep the Old Oaken Bucket in Bloomington.  The Hoosiers failed to fully take advantage of Purdue's vulnerability in the first half, and an attempted fourth quarter comeback fell short, thanks in part to a very strange call that was reminiscent of IU's 2009 loss to Michigan.  I have to admit that I am to some degree flying blind on the joint possession issue.  I am out of state and watched much of the second half in a restaurant with no sound on the TV, so until catching wind of it online I didn't even realize that the play was deemed unreviewable.  I don't understand it, and I thought the IU receiver caught it and hit the ground with it, but I'll defer judgment until I have a chance to read more about it.

Continue reading this post »