Murphy's Pub: The Indiana Rivalry

Illinois and Indiana square off for the 165th time tonight in Bloomington. Remarkably, in the 164 prior meetings, both teams have 82 wins. And if the Illini do not take the series lead tonight, it will be an epic disaster.

Illinois has never had a true geographical rival in basketball. Northwestern has never been relevant. Michigan State and Illinois developed a “rivalry” over the past decade, but that “rivalry” exists only because Michigan State and Illinois have played at a fairly similar level over that time. And it is really a very friendly rivalry. Tom Izzo and Bruce Weber say nothing but nice things to each other. There is no bad blood.

When I was in school (for the first four years anyway), Iowa was the natural rival. Given the large number of kids from the Chicago suburbs matriculating in Iowa City, there was sufficient fan interaction to make that a game to circle. Add in the historical hatred stemming from Bruce Pearl (boooooooo) and his illegal tape recording of Deon Thomas while an assistant at Iowa (a history lesson for another day) and there will always be bad blood between Iowa and Illinois. The Iowa rivalry fell on hard times after Iowa fell into basketball obscurity.

But Indiana is Illinois’ most bitter basketball rival, both currently and historically. Bobby Knight and Lou Henson may be great friends now, but there were not many frostier relationships when they coached opposite each other. To sum up this relationship, Knight thought Henson was dirty and went so far as to not shake hands with Henson after a game in 1991, leading to Henson’s famous quote wherein he referred to Knight as “a classic bully.” Henson went on to say that the whole state of Indiana was intimidated by Knight. Indiana fans were not amused. Fast forward to the Eric Gordon saga (cliff notes version for those new to sports in the Midwest, Gordon committed to Illinois while Mike Davis was the Hoosiers’ coach, then de-committed and committed to Indiana after Kelvin Sampson was hired. They played an ugly game in Champaign the next year wherein the Gordon family showed up wearing “Got Gordon” t-shirts and Gordon’s mother allegedly was struck by a cup filled with ice. Weber refused to shake hands with Sampson after the game). Well, as we all know, in the aftermath of the Gordon saga, Kelvin Sampson was found to be quite dirty and the Indiana program imploded. Turns out that some Indiana fans blame Weber and the attention of the Gordon fallout for shining a light on the dirty deeds of their once clean program. Indiana fans were polled prior to the Illini traveling to Bloomington the next year and asked, if they could only one team that year, Illinois or Purdue, who would they want to beat. Illinois won by a margin of 2 to 1. And the Purdue-Indiana rivalry is vicious.

Add to the history the fact that Indiana fans are some of the worst homers in the world (and I recognize that all fan bases - yes even Illinois, take a trip to Illiniboard.com if you don't believe me - are full of irrational and delusional fans, but trust me that Indiana has the highest proportion of those fans of any group I have been around). Tom Crean has landed some impressive recruits over the next two years. A co-worker of mine attributed that to the fact that “Indiana has the most tradition of any college basketball program in the country.” Yeah, because these kids totally were alive when the Hoosiers went undefeated in 1987. But that is absolutely the local sentiment. Indiana fans called into sports radio programs to gloat both times Robbie Hummel went out with ACL tears. And most of them still worship the ground upon which Bobby Knight walked and chastise Myles Brand for finally saying enough is enough and sending Knight packing.

There have been classic games. Shaun Pruitt will always be remembered for missing free throws against Indiana in ‘08 that would have won that ugly game in regulation. The enduring moment of the rivalry was Nick Anderson catching, turning, and burying a 35 foot three pointer at the buzzer in Bloomington in ‘89, probably the most memorable moment in Illinois basketball history until the Elite 8 game against Arizona in ‘05. And recently, the games have been close in spite of a monumental gap in talent. Illinois needed a layup at the buzzer by Demetri McCamey to win, in Champaign, last year 72-70. The Illini had to erase a 15 point deficit to win at Indiana last year as well. Yes, the rivalry is alive and well.

So for the 165th time, the Illini and the Hoosiers square off. Cheers to a continued, bitter rivalry and let’s get an Illini win tonight.