‘Better taste in our mouths’: IU football makes promising strides in Week 2 domination of Howard
- Ian Plaskoff
- 3m ago
The victory flag remains raised at Merchants Bank Field at Memorial Stadium after Indiana’s 55-0 win against Howard on Saturday.
It has been raised for 17 straight home games.
Indiana is still undefeated at home under head coach Curt Cignetti. Indiana is still a top-five team in the nation. Indiana is still regarded as a title contender.
None of that really matters in a game like Saturday’s. It was the expectation.
The bigger questions were how much Indiana could improve, how much experience younger players could get and how healthy Indiana could come out of the week.
Indiana made positive strides on all three fronts.
“Better taste in our mouths after this game, which was the goal,” Cignetti said. “It wasn’t perfect. Still mistakes. But there was mistakes that could be critical mistakes in big football games. But better and we need to continue to develop and get better.”
Offensively, Indiana put up 506 yards with 296 yards on the ground and 210 in the air. The Hoosiers only put up 365 yards of offense in the season-opener. Both Turbo Richard and Lee Beebe Jr. had over 100 rushing yards on at least seven yards per carry. The duo only rushed for 91 combined yards on 29 carries in Week 1. Indiana has now seen what its rushing duo is capable of at its best, but is still not content.
“Well, [we’re] never comfortable because every week is a new challenge,” Cignetti said. “It’s hard to run the football and then we know we get in Big Ten play, those yards are tough. That one drive early in the first half where we just handed the ball off and hammered them, I like doing that.”
Indiana ran the ball 46 times at 6.4 yards per carry and only completed nine passes on 16 attempts, yet only had one rushing touchdown. How?
Of the nine completions, six went for touchdowns.
Josh Hoover was only 6-for-11 passing for 146 yards, but did add four touchdowns. Charlie Becker had three receptions for 81 yards and three touchdowns. Nick Marsh had two receptions for 72 yards and a touchdown. Davion Chandler and Shazz Preston each had one catch for a touchdown as well.
Through the first two games of the season, Hoover has completed 19 passes, with eight of them being touchdowns. Becker has seven receptions, with five of them being touchdowns.
“I think it goes back to as soon as Josh got here,” Becker said of the connection with Hoover. “Just trying to build on that connection from the get-go, just going in the indoor, throwing early in the morning and then just hanging out outside of football, too. Just being friends.”
Both Hoover and Becker’s touchdown marks tie the FBS lead. Neither have played the whole game in Indiana’s first two weeks.
Defensively, Indiana played as dominant a performance as it could have.
Howard only had 57 yards on the day, with only 13 rushing yards. The Bison had more players with negative rushing yard totals (4) than positive rushing totals (3). Indiana had 12 tackles for loss and five sacks, with the highlight of the day being a Rolijah Hardy pick-six. The Hoosiers only allowed four Howard first downs, the lowest mark for Indiana since at least 1958.
“I think it’s chemistry,” Hardy said. “I think as we continue to play these games, we’re going to be able to play off of each other and I think today showed that. We keep a high standard. The standard is always going to be the standard. Coach Cig challenged us to get better this week and I think we did that.”
For the most part, starters played in the first half and gradually rotated out in the second half to make room for backups. The Hoosiers led 41-0 at the half with three touchdowns in each quarter.
Indiana certainly felt more comfortable and cohesive on Saturday, especially on defense. That is the purpose of scheduling FCS opponents in the nonconference slate.
The Hoosiers also acknowledge that there is much to clean up.
The win was a given. The week was a success. Indiana got better and found out what it needs to do to get even better. The defense found its groove. The offense stayed hot. Young players got reps. Injuries were kept to a minimum.
The Hoosiers will do it all again next week against Western Kentucky as they continue to build momentum ahead of Big Ten play.
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