What to Expect: IU basketball hosts Chicago State

Chicago State guard Doyel Cockrill III.

IU basketball begins a three-game homestead on Saturday afternoon against Chicago State. The Cougars are 2-10 and only have one win against a Division I opponent.

Saturday’s tipoff is set for 1 p.m. ET on B1G+.

Indiana will look to bounce back from an ugly second-half performance at Kentucky last Saturday when it hosts Chicago State this weekend at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall.

The Cougars are ranked in the bottom 20 in KenPom and are unlikely to provide any resistance. It will be the fifth all-time meeting between the two programs and the Hoosiers have won the first four by an average of 34 points.

MEET THE COUGARS

Chicago State is led by first-year coach Landon Bussie, who spent the last five seasons at Alcorn State before accepting the job last spring.

It will be a tall order for Bussie to make the Chicago State program competitive, even in the Northeast Conference, which ranks 30th out of 31 leagues nationally, according to KenPom. Chicago State hasn’t posted a winning record since the 2008-09 season, when it went 19-13 as an independent.

The Cougars are led in scoring by junior guard Doyel Cockrill. The 6-foot-3 native of Nashville, Tennessee, is averaging 15.1 points and is 21-for-47 on 3-pointers. He’s only started in three of the eight games he’s appeared in.

The other two Cougars averaging in double figures are 6-foot-5 senior guard Marcus Tankersly, who followed Bussie from Alcorn State, and 6-foot-6 senior wing CJ Ray.

Tankersly began his career at Detroit Mercy, where he played two seasons, then transferred to Alcorn State for his junior season. In his final season of eligibility at Chicago State, he’s averaging 14.7 points and shooting 45.1 percent from the field in a team-high 31.7 minutes per game.

Ray is a 34.1 percent 3-point shooter (41 attempts) and averages 10.8 points along with a team-high 4.3 rebounds in 27.3 minutes per game.

Freshman point guard Malek Robinson has started the last two games and averages a team-best 1.7 steals in 13.3 minutes per contest. The 5-foot-11 Robinson is averaging 3.5 points but is shooting only 30.3 percent from the field.

Like most low-major programs, Chicago State lacks legitimate size up front. Two rotation regulars up front include 6-foot-6 senior Dailliss Cox and 6-foot-8 senior Stephen Byard.

Cox, a Louisville native, had 19 points earlier this season in a 108-86 loss at Saint Louis. He averages 4.4 points and 3.8 rebounds in 17.1 minutes per game.

Byard has scored in double figures three times, including 16 points against DePaul and 15 points against Saint Louis in the first two games of the season. Byard averages 9.4 points but shoots just 38.6 percent from the field.

Chicago State has been without its fourth leading scorer, guard Braelon Bush, for the last four games. The status of the 5-foot-9 guard is unclear ahead of Saturday’s game. Bush scored in double figures four times in the first eight games and made seven starts.

TEMPO-FREE PREVIEW

All stats are updated through Wednesday’s games.

Indiana-Chicago St. tempo-free stats preview.

The Cougars have taken some lopsided losses through their first 12 games. Chicago State lost by 30 at DePaul, by 22 at Saint Louis, by 32 at Butler, by 39 at Iowa, by 23 at Youngstown State and by 42 at Illinois State. Their closest road loss came at Minnesota, where they fell 66-54.

There’s no reason to expect Saturday’s game to be competitive. Chicago State is allowing opponents to shoot 64.9 percent from 2-point range, which ranks second-to-last in the country. The Cougars rank 353rd in defensive rebounding percentage and are allowing an opponent free-throw rate of 40, which is 277th in the country.

Offensively, Chicago State is shooting just 29.7 percent on 3s (297th nationally) and 42.8 percent on 2s (353rd nationally). The Cougars are among the lowest 3-point volume teams in the country, with a 3PA/FGA rate of 27.4 percent.

WHAT IT COMES DOWN TO

As Chicago State is the only IU opponent currently ranked below 300 on KenPom, there’s no expectation of a competitive game on Saturday in Bloomington.

KenPom likes Indiana by 31 with over a 99 percent chance for a Hoosier victory. Bart Torvik likes IU by 36 and also has better than a 99 percent chance for an IU win.

Saturday should be an opportunity for the Hoosiers to go deep into their bench and limit their starters’ minutes, with another game to close out non-conference play against Siena on Monday night.

(Photo credit: Chicago State Athletics)

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