
For starters, I would be making more articles about the Jaguars, but a lot of personal stuff has affected me in the past month, and I’m not sure that this website is the time and the place for discussing them. That being said, I do have a BlueSky account (@johnathanochonueve.bsky.social) where I regularly comment on IU Indianapolis results if I can’t post full feedback as well as my thoughts on the Horizon League in addition to other things. Just some food for thought.
Anyway, unlike a certain school on the northside of Indianapolis that gets all of the attention that has been mired in a losing streak as of late, the Jaguars were in the midst of a seven-game losing streak of their own, but you wouldn’t notice. It wasn’t from a lack of trying, as the Jags lost by a possession to the Norse and Mastodons before substandard efforts against Lindenwood and Florida International.
Heading back into conference play, IU Indy’s struggles continued with further losses against Milwaukee, Youngstown State, and Cleveland State. In almost all of them, it felt like the team relied exclusively on Paul Zilinskas controlling most of the action and the team riding and dying from the three with no alternatives when the balls didn’t go through, much like during the Crenshaw era. During their loss to the Vikings, however, Zilinskas ended up getting injured, which resulted in Paul Corsaro changing gears and relying on his bench more than he has during conference play.
And this change was beneficial for a team that has tried to, yet was unsuccessful in, getting over that hump lately (as DeSean Goode stated in the team’s postgame, “(they) needed that one step to get over that hitch”), with their biggest win since joining the Horizon League in a 34-point dissection of the Detroit Mercy Titans, 95-61 (and their biggest since 2010, where they dominated the UMKC Roos by 38), giving me the confidence that it won’t just be Green Bay that’ll give these Jaguars wins this season. Jarvis Walker led the team with 20 points as six Jags reached double digits, with Alec Millender reaching his 1,000th career point in the triumph. Team-wise, they hit 18 out of 38 from beyond, and 17/23 free throws, compared to Detroit Mercy’s 5 out of 17 three-point attempts.
This wasn’t to say that the opposition was firing on all cylinders, however, as Detroit Mercy was without a few key players. Orlando Lovejoy, leading scorer for the Titans, was out with an ankle injury, and having to rely on less experienced players due to the loss of Mak Manciel and Jared Lary, the upstart Titans ended up committing 16 turnovers and giving up eight steals. But, when you’re in the Horizon, you don’t question the quality of your wins, especially when you’re a program like IU Indy, as you must win these games.
Speaking of teams that are not doing so hot, the Jaguars will be playing against Oakland this Wednesday up in Michigan. Oakland is yet another program that has dominance over IU Indy, having won six straight. Milwaukee and Cleveland State have maintained their streaks, but can the Golden Grizzlies keep theirs?