Mailbag: High school versus portal recruiting, how IU can change the narrative and more

The Inside the Hall Mailbag is a collection of questions sent to us via X (@insidethehall), via email, submitted via our community and our Facebook page. Submit your questions and we’ll answer as many as we can.

@RonaldChronsoon writes: I know there is a lot of noise about the 2025 class, but in my opinion, it doesn’t change the fact that the future of team building is through the portal. Do you still think fans should reset expectations with HS recruits in this new age of college basketball?

Undoubtedly, the transfer portal is a major part of building a college basketball roster in 2024. We saw Indiana add six pieces from the portal in the offseason and it’s a big reason the Hoosiers are ranked in the preseason Associated Press top 25 poll to begin the season.

However, Indiana fans shouldn’t be resetting or lowering expectations with high school recruiting. Since arriving in Bloomington, Mike Woodson has added numerous highly-ranked players from the high school ranks. Five of them were ranked in the top 30 nationally: Mackenzie Mgbako, Bryson Tucker, Malik Reneau, Jalen Hood-Schifino and Tamar Bates. Woodson himself has said he wants a seat at the table with the nation’s best recruits and will attempt to recruit the top players.

The Hoosiers should still be recruiting players from the high school ranks and trying to develop them for success in Bloomington and for the next level. Any successful program needs some level of roster continuity, too. It’s essential to have players like Trey Galloway or Reneau, who have been in your program for multiple years and are significant contributors.

Frales writes: If you were the coach, how would you piece together recruiting between the portal and high school players especially since the extra COVID year is ending?

It’s a great question, Frales. College coaching staffs are still trying to figure it out. As currently constructed, the portal is still relatively new to the game. You can build a successful roster in a variety of ways. Some programs choose to emphasize the portal almost exclusively. Others, like Purdue, didn’t take a portal player this offseason and signed a huge freshman class.

The sweet spot is likely a mix of both worlds. Threading that needle is difficult, though. Indiana has recruited mainly top-50 players. When they land a small high school class, as we saw in the 2024 cycle, the staff works the portal to build a roster. Indiana navigated the situation this past cycle, but can the Hoosiers continue to rely so heavily on the portal and land small classes of high school players? Time will tell.

The extra COVID year being gone will simplify roster management. Coaches will no longer have to wonder if a player will take the extra year at their school, move on from the game completely or transfer. It was a headache for coaches to manage that will be gone.

@samiamiu on X writes: Does the success of the football team impact the NIL for ALL sports or just football? Does Cignetti’s success put more pressure on Woodson?

Most NIL contributions are typically made to specific programs or players. The football team’s success should bring more NIL money from donors who will be more enthusiastic about helping the football program. The collectives can obviously point out areas of potential need to donors and encourage them to help in other areas, but football success will primarily impact football NIL.

The biggest thing Cignetti’s success thus far highlights is the turnaround can be quick if the right coach is in the job. It is no longer a years-long endeavor to build a successful program in college athletics. The days of a total teardown and rebuild, at least at the programs with adequate NIL and program resources, are over. Cignetti showed that things can change quickly. As for whether his success puts more pressure on Woodson, there’s already an extreme amount of pressure on Indiana’s fourth-year coach. The expectations this season are for Indiana to win big. The roster appears to be in place to do so.

Paul Treadwell Jr. on Facebook writes: As a lifelong Hoosier fan, why have we not been able to get consistent outside shooters to space the floor? We were known for shooting and now it’s leave him open and sag off of him. How can we get the better shooters to start coming back to IU basketball?

The better shooters want to play in programs that emphasize perimeter shooting in their offense. Indiana hasn’t had an offense emphasizing perimeter shooting since Tom Crean was fired in March 2017.

Woodson has said the offense will look different this winter and the Hoosiers will take more perimeter shots. If that happens, IU will be able to show that offense on the recruiting trail and be more attractive to more of the nation’s top shooters. If it doesn’t happen, the lack of perimeter shooting in the offense will continue to be used against the program on the recruiting trail.

Shk Nqk writes: This team has an opportunity to change the narrative about IU basketball. Winning cures all ills but from a style of play perspective, what are three specific metrics that we should be watching and what is the threshold that you think will need to be achieved in those metrics to change the narrative? Shooting? Defense? Rebounding? Pace of Play? Substitution metric? Minutes playing two bigs?

You mentioned that winning cures all ills. You’re right. The number one metric is wins. If IU wins enough games, the rest of the discussions fade into the background.

But how does IU get there? The Hoosiers must improve in a few key areas. Shooting is the clear No. 1. Everyone knows the 3-point shooting numbers from last season. Indiana was in the bottom 15 in the country in point distribution on 3s. That has to change. It’s hard to put a specific threshold on where that number should be, but getting the point distribution on 3s into the mid-to-high 20 percentage range would be progress (it was 20.9 percent last season).

Free-throw shooting is next. Indiana’s offense values getting to the line, but the Hoosiers shot just 66.4 percent from the line last season, which ranked 333rd in the country. Getting to 70 percent should put Indiana somewhere in the top 275 in the country. That should be the minimum goal.

Rebounding is also another area to watch. Last season, Indiana was 254th in offensive rebounding percentage and 211th in defensive rebounding percentage. The Hoosiers have the personnel to be much better on the glass on both ends. Again, it’s hard to put a threshold on rebounding percentage numbers, but ranking in the top half nationally in both would be progress.

David Macer writes: This is going to be strange coming from the long-time optimist. How hot is Woody’s seat really this year? If he finishes in the top three in the B1G and loses in first or second round of the Big Dance will he be retained?

Tom Jordan writes: What does Woody have to do this year to stop the 2nd guessing?

Since these questions are similar, I decided to try and address both simultaneously. While hot seat lists make for entertaining preseason discussions, most athletic directors and decision-makers don’t enter a season entertaining those discussions. Any coach needs his or her administration’s full support to have the best chance at success.

I also don’t believe there should be a specific number of wins or an NCAA tournament round that a coach must reach to be retained. I think after any season, the person in charge of the hiring and firing in any program or organization takes a look at the full body of work and tries to answer these questions: Are we moving in the right direction? Do we have a chance with this coach or leader to reach our potential as a program or organization? If the answer is yes, you move forward. If the answer is no, you move on and go in a different direction.

As for Woodson specifically, the second-guessing is never going to be gone. Fans second-guessed Bob Knight, who was one of the best coaches in the sport. Most fans would feel better about IU basketball if the offense was more modern, the Hoosiers took care of business easily against inferior opponents and the Hoosiers won more conference road games. Doing all of those things should lead to more wins and less second-guessing.

Category: Commentary

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