Hoosiers Have San Francisco Treat

BLOOMINGTON - Monroe County resident and recording artist John Mellencamp, sitting in the third row behind a basket, watched much of Sunday's Indiana/San Francisco basketball game with his chin resting in his hand.

Likewise, San Francisco coach Philip Mathews watched much of the second half with his chin in his hand, switching hands depending which end of the court he was looking at.

The sharp-dressed man in the dark suit could do little else from his bench as he helplessly watched No. 10 Indiana (11-2) drub his Dons (7-4) 106-54. His face was expressionless, and with Indiana up 60-37 with 13:23, he seemed to be a coach resigned to his fate.

"Indiana is a better team than we are," he said. "Indiana is 52 points better than we are. They put on a clinic, like coach (Bob) Knight's teams do. They beat us in every facet of the game. It was a thorough a- whipping."

So thorough that the Dons turned the ball over 32 times, which led to 42 Indiana points.

So thorough that Indiana players named Larry Richardson and Rob Turner, at times no more than seldom-used role players, started and combined for 30 points on 14-of-18 shooting. Turner scored 18, while Richardson scored 12 and blocked six shots.

So thorough that the Hoosiers took 60 shots and made twice as many (40) as they missed (20), 67 percent shooting from the field.

So thorough that only the clock could do what San Francisco couldn't: stop Indiana. The Hoosiers ended the game on a 31-4 run in the last seven minutes as they outscored the Dons 67-26 in the second half.

Said Mathews: "They switched around on us defensively, they jammed us inside, they took away the passing lanes, and they made it hard to penetrate. Indiana's defense made our offense bad."

Indiana finished with five scorers in double figures. In addition to Turner and Richardson, A.J. Guyton scored 17, Kirk Haston 12 and Luke Recker 10.

The Hoosiers turned the game into a blowout just five minutes into the second half, when they upped a 39-28 halftime lead to 51-32. San Francisco got no closer than 16 the rest of the way.

Dane Fife's steal and layup capped Indiana's 12-4 run to start the half.

"At halftime, coach Knight said, 'Let's really press them the first five minutes and deny passes to the wings,'" Fife said. "We just dominated in the second half.

"I think they just got frustrated. They couldn't get their passes to anybody. Their scorer, (Gerald) Zimmerman, couldn't get the ball. We did a great job of switching on defense."

Zimmerman came in averaging 18.5 points per game. Before this game, Zimmerman's season low was nine, in a 69-62 loss to UCLA. He finished with nine against Indiana.

When Mathews finally broke from his chin-resting-in-his-hand pose, it cost him. His team down 79-50 with 5:49 left, he told a referee: "You talk to me."

Instead of talking, the referee slapped a technical foul on him.

Then another. And another. And another.

By the time the referee had finished, he hit Mathews with four technical fouls. Mathews, who is 51-36 in three years at San Francisco, had never been kicked out of a game before in his life. He did not curse the referee once but earned four technical fouls for telling the referee who to talk to.

"I thought it was very uncalled for," he said. "The game was 40 (actually 29) points. The game was over. I told him 'Don't talk to my assistants, talk to me.' He teed me up.

"Coach Knight told me he had been there and done that. If my assistants hadn't pulled me away, I would have gotten 10 technicals.

"That official had rabbit ears."

The free throws even went against San Francisco. The Hoosiers were supposed to get eight technical foul shots, but the officials mistakenly awarded them nine.

Knight had trouble finding a guy to convert. Jimenez went 1 for 3 when Knight stood up and pointed Jarrad Odle to the line. Odle missed the first, leading Indiana's A.J. Guyton, by now on the bench, to jokingly point another player to the line. But when Odle missed his second, Knight followed through on Guyton's wishes by directing Kirk Haston to the line. Haston was money, hitting 4 of 4.

In a game Indiana could do no wrong, things somehow managed to get even better for the Hoosiers. With 4:58 left, point guard Antwaan Randle El, bandaged right hand and all, made his debut as an Indiana basketball player to a standing ovation.

Randle El, playing with a right hand wrapped in white tape and a cast the size of a club, had one good hand.

He used it. He hit a layup and a three-pointer and two assists and two rebounds. His layup came after he pressured San Francisco's in-bounds pass at the other end of the court.

A reporter told Knight he had to be happy to see Randle El play. Said Knight: "Well, yeah. The people were happy, too.

"It was amazing. He has that right hand, yet he hit a layup and a three-point shot."

But Mathews said he knew Indiana would be tough to beat from the start when Richardson put on a shooting clinic early in the game.

"He made shots I have never seen him make before," Mathews said.

Said Knight: "I thought Richardson played very well. He has been since the Kentucky game. What's happened with Richardson is, I told him if he plays well in practice, he gets to play in games.

"You people (reporters) get carried away with a player being in somebody's doghouse. That's bull--. You earn your playing time. I would like to see one writer understand that. I don't think I ever will."

Only one day earlier Knight fretted that his team was on a downward spiral after playing well earlier in the season. Knight told one reporter the Hoosiers looked so bad in practice Saturday they "couldn't have beaten you and four like you."

Mathews did not see that Indiana team Sunday.

"Indiana is a better team than we are," he said. "They have more talent than we do. Indiana could have beaten anybody in the country today the way they played."

Notes: Recker, Indiana's leading scorer at 16.1 points per game, scored none in the first half, but the Hoosiers still led 39-28 at halftime ... Indiana broke one record and tied another one. The Hoosiers set a record with 12 blocked shots - six by Turner, three by Lynn Washington and one each by Luke Jimenez, Fife and Haston. The Hoosiers tied a record by shooting .889 behind the three-point arc. They made 8 of 9. ... Two of San Francisco's wins came at home against St. Louis (61-53) and against Xavier (82-69) in Puerto Rico. Before the loss to Indiana, San Francisco had lost to UCLA (69-62) in Puerto Rico, at Montana State (81-66) and at Fairfield (93-75). Counting the Montana State and Fairfield games, San Francisco has lost three in a row.