One game into the regular season, head coach Teri Moren is not pleased with her Hoosiers' 22-point victory.
“I’m glad we got a win to begin the season, but I would be up here lying if I told you I was at all pleased with any of that tonight,” Moren said. “Definitely not the way I wanted to open our season. A win, sure, but this performance tonight will not win you any Big Ten game.”
Monday night, Indiana hosted Brown at Assembly Hall to kick off the regular season, where they ultimately won 82-60, led by old faces and a new face.
Tennessee transfer Karoline Striplin, who was coming off the bench, was the new face stepping up. In just 12 minutes, the senior forward scored 17 points on 6-for-8 shooting from the field. Standing at 6-foot-3, she was dominant in the paint, with five rebounds and consistently crashing the boards on both ends.
Striplin felt at home in her first regular season game at Assembly Hall.
“It starts in the locker room,” Striplin said. “Coach talks a lot about sharing the wealth and I feel like everybody on the team embodies that, and stepping out in front of 10,050 fans is incredible. Even just doing the Alma Mater at the end means a lot.”
Among Striplin in the leading scorers, graduate student guard Sydney Parrish finished with her eighth career double-double, scoring 20 points along with 10 rebounds — her first 20-10 game of her career. The leader for the Hoosiers was igniting the energy on the court, staying vocal at all times even on the bench.
The other leader for IU was graduate student guard Chloe Moore-McNeil who had a quiet game, recording just two points, grabbing four rebounds, dishing five assists and turning the ball over four times. However, it was Moore-McNeil’s 100th win in the Cream and Crimson.
Turnovers were a big issue for Indiana on Monday night. They recorded a total of 18, many of which were miscommunications or sloppy plays that resulted in easy buckets on the other end. Moren was unhappy with her team’s play, especially on the defensive side. Indiana allowed 11 3-pointers for the Bears. While Brown went 11-for-36 from long range, Moren was still upset her team even allowed the Bears to put up that many shots.
“It's the first game. There's still butterflies for some of these guys. But it's just unacceptable to me that we gave up 11 3s,” Moren said. “We left a shooter off the strong side. We never do that. We switched a guard to five on a screen, we never do that. It's those little things.”
In addition to Moren’s frustration towards the Indiana defense, she also noted how her team did not take advantage of its threat in the paint on offense. Browns starting center senior Gianna Aiello was in foul trouble for a majority of the game. So with the 6-foot-4 presence in the paint, the Hoosiers were not taking advantage of their size. Indiana did finish with 46 points in the paint, but could have been much more.
Coming off a nearly flawless exhibition game, junior forward Lilly Meister was quieter but still notable for Indiana. She recorded 13 points with six rebounds in 21 minutes. The matchup between Meister and Aiello in the paint was physical, as both players recorded fouls on one another in the first three minutes of the game. Aiello was held to zero points and grabbed seven rebounds until she ultimately fouled out of the game.
The Hoosiers did, however, play together as they finished the night with 20 assists on 30 made field goals and four players scoring in double digits. Junior transfer guard Shay Ciezki struggled with her shot, going 3-for-11 and 0-for-3 from long range. However, she was impactful in the paint, standing at just 5-foot-7. It was often that Ciezki was one of the first players to put a body on a player when a shot went up or that she was constantly driving to the basket to generate buckets despite not being able to knock down shots.
Although it was the Hoosiers’ 12th straight season opener win, there is much to improve as non-conference play continues. Indiana will play another Ivy League opponent in Harvard on Thursday at 7 p.m. at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall.
