Romeo Langford should come off the bench

Hey, thanks for clicking on this article! If you didn’t actually click on this and are hollering into the void on Twitter, that’s fine too. You will look dumb online.

You see, this clickbait headline was merely to get your attention, which is something Indiana basketball has never failed to do. Indiana football, however, cannot say the same.

Since the dawn of time, Indiana football has played second fiddle to the beloved candy stripe pant wearers inside Assembly Hall. And that’s okay! But Indiana football deserves your attention too.

I’m not going to sit here and beg you to devote the same amount of attention to football as you do to #iubb, but nobody wins when football is disregarded by a significant portion of the fan base. Hell, I’ve been guilty of it. I have friends and family that are guilty of it. But for Indiana football to become a consistent program, there has to be some buy in from the fans.

On the field, many are skeptical about Tom Allen’s ability to build a consistent winner. He failed in his first year to extend Indiana’s streak of bowl games, which is understandable since Indiana has only strung together consecutive bowl game appearances three times in the history of the program. His second year might not be much better. But by all accounts he seems like has really bought in to trying to build a program at Indiana. And as one of Indiana’s own as a former high school football coach from our state, that should be something to root for.

Fred Glass has done his part, as our own Alex Robbins touched on last week. Under his watch, the university has poured money into upgrades to Memorial Stadium. It will never have the atmosphere of The Big House or The Horseshoe, but it shows a commitment to a football program that desperately needs it.

That’s where you come in.

It will not kill (literally, I mean) you to pay attention to Indiana football. It’s okay to tune in on a Saturday to watch them struggle against a team from Conference USA. It’s part of the experience! You tuned in when the basketball team got ran off the floor by in-state mid-major schools. Why not do the same for football?

Nobody is expecting you to go all in on football right now. Maybe start slow this year. Try to watch the games on television if you had not planned on doing so. Maybe next year you try to make it out to a game. Next time you go to the message board to see which recruit Archie Miller is trying to land next, hop on over to the football side and see what Tom Allen is up to on the recruiting trail. Maybe a few years down the road, you become fully invested in the program like many of us on this blog and can really get the Indiana Football Experience. It can be exciting!

There will assuredly be a point in the season where Indiana is up late on a Top 10 opponent only to falter late with a backbreaking loss. Hundreds of people and other Indiana sites will rush to Twitter to get off some “At least there’s only X amount of days until Hoosier Hysteria!!! #iubb” tweets. Do not be one of those people. Nobody cares about the 0/2/2 slash you would get on it.

Instead, enjoy the ups and downs of Indiana football. Enjoy the cathartic experience of a Mike DeBord third down play call that winds up short of the sticks. Enjoy the merciless beat down of Rutger. Enjoy the trash talk with Purdue fans over the Bucket game, and make sure you throw in a jab about Jeff Brohm leaving for Louisville for good measure.

Enjoy the chase for a bowl game. It’s not #Banner6, but it quantifies success for the Indiana football program. And success for the football program means success for the athletic department. And success for the athletic department can lead to success for the basketball team. And deep down, isn’t that what you, a Real Hoosier Fan, truly want?

Anyways, Romeo Langford probably shouldn’t come off the bench. But I don’t care about that right now, and neither should you. Indiana football is upon us, and it’s time for everybody to buy in. Including you.