Skip Bayless’ relentless attacks on coach Bob Knight and Indiana basketball (Sports, Mar. 11 and 19) are not only unfair and biased but outright hateful.
Bayless has decided that Indiana basketball has gone completely downhill. However, IU is the only Big 10 team to make it to the NCAA tournament every year in the ’90s. How do you find fault with that?
Knight accomplished that with only one really good team, in 1992. In fact, this year’s pre-season polls predicted Indiana to finish near the bottom. Yet, Indiana had a great year and overachieved. Isn’t that what you want from a coach?
Indiana has had a quality team year in and year out regardless of the talent. Yet Bayless claims that the Indiana players are psychologically worn out, and scared come March.
This is ridiculous. Does he have inside knowledge about the relationships the players have with Knight?
Admittedly, the Pepperdine game was a big upset and clearly disappointing to Indiana fans. However, what Bayless neglects to mention is that Kirk Haston–the best rebounder on the team and second best scorer–was injured in the first minute of the game. This was a big blow to a team that is not very deep.
Also, give some credit to Pepperdine. Every time A. J. Guyton touched the ball, he was swamped by two or three defenders rendering him useless.
Bayless, however, decided Guyton’s poor performance was because he was scared. Scared of winning? Guyton was just very well defended and the rest of the Indiana players didn’t step up.
Lastly, let’s also blame the media. Why was a 3-year-old story of Knight’s dustup with ex-player Neil Reed aired two days before the tournament?
That story and the resulting media attention were extremely unfair to the current team. Clearly, that caused undue stress for the kids on this team.
If they seemed tired, blame it on the media guys like Bayless who, in their quest to bring down Knight, don’t care about the kids who play for Indiana!
