Checking in with ... Indiana (cont.)

Luke Winn's Mailbag Have questions or feedback? E-mail Luke Winn. Name: Email: Hometown: Question: SEND Follow Luke Winn on Twitter

As far as Pritchard and Tijan Jobe, a 7-foot juco transfer from Olney Central College, may have progressed since coming to IU, they're still the sort of interior projects who would need a year to develop in a typical Big Ten program. Here, they're being thrown into the fire and counted on to provide immediate rebounding help. The Hoosiers have no real depth in the frontcourt, unless it comes from yet-to-be-named football players whom Crean is trying to coax over to the hardwood following their regular season. When asked if those players would be used to pad out practice rosters, Crean said, "I doubt we'd just use them for practice. I'd expect them to be on the court."

Because of the time he's had to spend in workouts on simple instruction -- things like defensive footwork -- Crean says the Hoosiers' playbook will have to be a drastically abridged version what previously ran at Marquette. As of last Thursday, he said he'd only been able to introduce 12-15 offensive sets, whereas with a veteran roster, like the Golden Eagles have, he might've already introduced 50-55 things between man and zone offense, press offense, and baseline and sideline out-of-bounds plays. Crean said he had nearly 200 sets available (although not always in the rotation) at Marquette, and insisted that such a level of complexity is a good primer for the pros. "You should read an NBA playbook sometime, or better yet, an NFL playbook every week," he said. "I've never tried to short-change somebody's ability to learn an offense and be prepared to run it at the next level."

During the lunch, many of the TVs at Coaches Cafe were tuned to NBATV, which happened to be showing an All-Access program with the Miami Heat. There was no audio (the house stereo was playing instead) but when Dwyane Wade came on the screen at one point, it caused Crean to stop mid-sentence and say, "I haven't seen this one yet." He was still very much transfixed by the guard who led his Marquette team to the Final Four in 2003, a run that put Crean on the trajectory toward landing a job like Indiana. If only the Hoosiers had a D-Wade now, to lift them out of the muck.

Sans superstars or much hope for a .500 season, the present-day program is less of an obsession for Hoosiers students, many of whom came to Bloomington hoping Big Ten titles would be part of their collegiate experience. Crean has therefore felt the need to take on the role of tireless promoter: The front page of Thursday's Indiana Daily Student featured a large photo of Crean with a quote, 'We need our student fan base,' as the top-story headline. Dismayed by the slow sales of student season tickets -- and the potential that student seats might be ceded to civilians -- Crean made this plea: "I don't want [ticket sales] to become a disappointment because we might be a disappointment in the short term."

To recruits, Crean can pitch playing time and a revival of what he calls the "lifestyle" of Indiana basketball. For potential student-section occupants, Crean said later on Thursday, the short-term is about "being part of something that nobody has any idea what to expect, most importantly the head coach, who's with [the team] every day, doesn't have any idea what to expect." Uncertainty certainly creates intrigue. Intrigue may very well give way to a pile of Big Ten losses. But for now, it's a much easier sell than patience.