Malik Reneau lobbed the ball up and Kel’el Ware slammed it down to put an exclamation point on Indiana’s 89-80 win over Wright State.
“We call it buddy ball,” Indiana head coach Mike Woodson said.
Reneau and Ware led Indiana to victory on Thursday night — Reneau with the lob of 16 points, eight rebounds and five assists, and Ware with the slam of 22 points, 12 rebounds, two assists and two blocks.
The growing chemistry between the sophomores continues to be a strong point for this young Indiana team. But it isn’t new for Reneau, who learned a thing or two from two former stars in the Indiana frontcourt last season.
“Just looking back at Race [Thompson] and Trayce [Jackson-Davis], I’ve been seeing it the whole last year, the buddy ball system,” Reneau said. “I had a bunch of passes where I caught it high, threw the lob pass over the top to Trayce last year, too. Just keep working on that and keep trying to find my buddy.”
The two of them are a blossoming bright spot for the Hoosiers, as the two have combined for a total of 100 points and 46 rebounds in Indiana’s first three games.
An area of concern, however, has been Indiana’s ability to come out of the gates hot, which did not seem to be an issue Thursday at Assembly Hall. In fact, it was a strength.
Scoring 54 of their 89 points in the first half, the Hoosiers seemed to finally click on both sides of the ball.
“I thought we got out to a great start,” Woodson said. “[It was] the first time this unit in a real game, established themselves on both ends of the floor from a defensive standpoint and putting the ball in the hole.”
But with a positive, always comes a negative.
Issues with defending the perimeter and free-throw shooting have continued to plague the Hoosiers within the first three games of the season.
Allowing 11 3-point field goals did not bring success for Indiana on the defensive end, with seven coming from Andrew Welage off of the bench, who had not scored a single point before this game.
With the key absence of Wright State’s leading scorer Trey Calvin, Welage was the one to step up and ended with 25 points on the night, no doubt a career best.
On the offensive side of the ball, it was difficult for free throws to fall for Indiana, ending 20-for-32 from behind the line.
“We haven’t put a perfect game together,” Woodson said. “The game before this game we made our free throws. We didn’t make them tonight. The 3-ball has been a major concern. We haven’t shot the 3-ball very well. So I figure if you put all those together, boy, life might be pretty good.”
Slowly, but surely, Indiana continues to find what does and does not work for their young team. They will need to fix those mistakes within the next couple of practices and work to put a perfect game together, as the Hoosiers face their biggest test yet on Sunday.
Sunday marks the start of the 2023 Empire Classic, where Indiana and the No. 5 UConn Huskies will tip things off in New York at Madison Square Garden. The Hoosiers will also face either the Louisville Cardinals or the No. 19 Texas Longhorns on Monday.
