Coming off of the win, Hoosier Nation was pumped. Twitter and Facebook activity yesterday showed fans more enthusiastic about their team than they had been in a long time. People were finally banding together around a team that, for the past few years, has been facing a strained relationship between fan base and team.
That all was supposed to change when a very evenly matched Maryland team came to town. Maryland was just the kind of game that should have been a win, maybe a challenging win, but a win to prove Indiana's toughness. Instead, things got bad fast.
A first half that kept things close showed an Indiana defense that was as bad as it had been a year ago, and an offense failing to make up for it. The second half was a pure blow-out, embarrassing the Hoosiers and sending Maryland to their first Big Ten Conference win.
The sad fact of the matter was that this game was a program defining opportunity. They dropped the ball. They had the opportunity to take an energized group of fans and show them that they were committed to making the program better.
If it had been a close game, a tightly fought contest, it would have been one thing. But it was a lack-luster effort at best, and resulted in a large collection of Hoosier fans walking away before the final whistle blew.
I will always be a Hoosiers fan. But sometimes, I wish the Hoosiers would play like they cared about their fans.
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