The Indiana men’s soccer team has seven games remaining with a 3-3-4 record, and the Hoosiers are in danger of missing the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1986.
The frustrations of the 2023 season for the team have continued to grow. The inability to consistently score has put the Hoosiers in very unfamiliar territory. From 1987-2022, Indiana has seen 37 consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances and has won six of the program’s eight national championships.
The preseason rankings according to the United Soccer Coaches Poll had Indiana at No. 2, and logically so after its runner-up performance in the College Cup final, so the team’s struggles have surprised people all around the country.
Goal scoring has been a struggle all season long for the Hoosiers. Through 10 games, Indiana has only scored seven goals, been shut out four times and only scored multiple goals in one game; which has been a major factor in the 1-1-3 record through the last five games and the 0-1-2 record in the Big Ten.
Up to this point Indiana has only scored one goal in conference play which came in the 2-1 defeat at Michigan State where Sam Sarver was able to get on the board to equalize the game in the 20th minute.
The Hoosiers still have their toughest conference slate ahead of them as they will be at University Park on Saturday to take on Penn State who currently is second in the conference at 6-1-3 (2-0-1 B1G) and sits at No. 19 in the latest poll.
Just two weeks later the Hoosiers will travel to take on first-place Northwestern who has shocked the soccer world this season after being projected to finish eighth in the Big Ten this season.
The Wildcats sit atop of the conference with an unbeaten 8-0-3 (2-0-1) performance that has them holding a top-15 slot in the latest poll at No. 12.
Now the nature of the NCAA Tournament has typically leaned more toward the RPI rankings where according to the latest tournament projections, both Penn State and Northwestern are just on the bubble.
The Hoosiers sit way back at No. 81 according to RPI. The road to make the 48-team postseason has certainly narrowed. So what needs to happen?
“We can truly start to evaluate once we have played five conference games,” Indiana head coach Todd Yeagley said.
Indiana has five remaining conference games in order with Big Ten standings: at No. 2 Penn State (Saturday), vs. No. 8 Ohio State (Oct. 15), at No. 9 (last) Maryland (Oct. 20), at No. 1 Northwestern (Oct. 24) and at No. 6 Rutgers (Oct. 29). There are two non-conference games still to play with both being at home with Evansville (Oct. 11) and Trine (Oct. 27).
One win in conference play can make all the difference and light the much-needed fire in this Hoosiers team as currently No. 7 Indiana (two points) is only down five points to the top Northwestern (seven) and Penn State (seven).
The Hoosiers have three of the bottom four teams in the conference remaining with two of the games being at home in opportunities to spark the win streak.
There is truly no telling what a win on Saturday could do for the Hoosiers in terms of their overall rankings, but this is a team that has done quite a bit of knocking all season long as they rank 12th in total shots per game in the nation (15.8) to have only seven goals to show for it.
If Indiana continues with its ways of low-scoring draws to close out the season and especially the Big Ten season, then all hopes of a 38th straight tournament appearance will have to come from one of the most impressive turnarounds in the Big Ten Tournament.
