Light work.
It was truly never a contest when Indiana rolled over Western Illinois 77-3, but it was never expected to be.
There is a very real chance that Western Illinois is the worst division-I college football group in the entire country. Which isn’t necessarily the Leathernecks’ fault, it’s Joe Davis’ first year as the head coach of a team that has not emerged victorious in a football game since 2021.
They were expected to be very bad. They were in fact very bad. Historically bad.
The Hoosiers scored more points than they have… ever. Indiana broke a 100+ year old record on Saturday night by piling x amount of points onto those poor sods.
It’s not like Indiana kept the starters in, they put the second string in halfway through the third quarter and let them get two series worth of drives (both touchdowns) before getting the third stringers into the game.
They just… also scored.
Yeah let’s get into this.
There are no good broad takeaways
You can’t use a game against an FCS opponent, especially the most hapless one in the entire country, for too many individual takeaways, let alone broad referendums on a football team and its immediate future.
The biggest revelation, if you can call it that, is that the broadcast noted that Alberto Mendoza got the third string job at quarterback. Which would mean he beat out fellow true freshman and former Center Grove quarterback Tyler Cherry.
Was it that or just getting as many guys as many snaps as possible, which is what you should do in these games? We’ll see if Cignetti says anything about it.
But yeah.
Confidence
Indiana spread out the scoring with plenty of different Hoosiers finding the endzone. Which, good.
For what it’s worth, it can build confidence for some guys. If you’re going to ask a guy to climb a mountain it’s probably helpful to have him walk up a hill first.
This is especially true for Indiana’s running backs room, which features plenty of talent and experience from top to bottom. You’re probably going to see more of Ty Son Lawton getting the ball in the red zone, but Justice Ellison breaking a long run for the endzone is encouraging.
Explosive runs have been few and far between for Indiana these past few years. If Indiana’s running backs can get a few under their belt now, why not.
They scored 77 points.
Indiana football scored 77 points.