Young Indiana women’s basketball ‘not going to lose hope’ after 0-8 Big Ten start

It was a “tale of two halves,” Indiana women’s basketball coach Teri Moren said Thursday night.

His team had a tall task facing No. 11 Ohio State, but for the first 20 minutes, they were up to the task. Indiana started the game on a 13-4 run and maintained that advantage throughout the first half, leading by as many as 15 points and entering halftime with a 10-point lead.

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Then, as is the case with most of Indiana’s losses so far this season, the game fell apart in the second half.

“A tale of two halves. I thought we played really well in the first half,” Moren said after IU’s 81-67 loss in Columbus. “I loved the way we shared the ball, kept them out of transition, did a lot of really, really good things (in the first half). And then, you know, the second half came, and we knew they were going to increase their pressure. We didn’t handle it the way we needed to.”

IU collapsed under Ohio State’s full-field pressure in the second half, with the Buckeyes guarding the interior and all receivers in the backcourt.

Ohio State initiated 16 steals in 40 minutes, and IU had 26 turnovers to put Ohio State up 34 points. So even though IU shot 56% from the field (22 of 39) with a 64% 3-point mark (11 of 17), Ohio State had a clear advantage with 25 more shot attempts on 48.4% shooting from the field (31 of 64).

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“Twenty-six turnovers is going to make it pretty tough to win a basketball game,” said redshirt sophomore Lenee Beaumont, IU’s leading scorer with 20 points. “And I think it just comes down to helping each other out. You know, there were a few in the first half where we left people on an island, or I remember one in particular in the second half, where we got the rebound and then they came back and trapped Shay (Ciezki) and we’re all running and to the other side of half court. So we have to be more aware.”

It was yet another learning lesson for the young Hoosiers, who are now 0-8 in Big Ten play with no end in sight.

With a lot of turnover due to graduations and entering the transfer portal after the 2024-25 season, Moren has a young team — even younger, she says, than it looks on paper.

Maya Makalusky and Nevaeh Caffey, both starters, are freshmen. Moren also considers sophomores Zania Socka-Nguemen and Beaumont pseudo-freshmen, considering how little they played before this season.

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Socka-Nguemen transferred to Indiana after a year at UCLA, where she played minimal minutes. Beaumont played minimal minutes off the bench as a rookie at Indiana in 2023-24, then sat out the entire 2024-25 season with a knee injury.

“Maya and Nevaeh are true freshmen, but you’re talking about two other kids who have had little to no playing time in the Big (Ten) and that’s a very, very good conference,” Moren said. “And we’ve played all of those, and you know who have been ranked so far, right? We haven’t had an easy path to start playing in the Big Ten. And you know, that’s part of it. It’s the league, that’s how good it is. And, you know, nobody feels sorry for Indiana.”

Moren’s job is also to teach his younger players how to overcome this tough run of games. IU has had a lot of success as a program over the past five years, including a Big Ten championship and the No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament, so this is uncharted territory — and probably not what the players expected when they committed to the Hoosiers.

But that’s where they are right now. And Moren must ensure that his players do not lose hope in this sequence.

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“It’s just a piece of communication, right,” Moren said. “It’s about making sure that we show them, you know, the things in the film, the lessons that we need to learn. But it’s also about showing them all the things that they’re doing well. And then last night, at the end of the night, when we watched the film, we did a deep dive into some of the analysis, some of the statistics. We’re so close, and that’s what we keep telling them.”

Last release: Message from Teri Moren to the IUWBB: “If 0-7 doesn’t light your back…”

Insider: As season turns, Indiana women’s basketball needs ‘fighting spirit’

IU could have opportunities for its first Big Ten win in its upcoming games; it will face rival Purdue, which is 2-6 in the Big Ten, on January 25 and February 8, and Northwestern, also 2-6 in the conference, on February 1.

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And Beaumont believes his team will fight for it.

“Believe it or not, I think the fight in the locker room is really in a good place and we’re not going to give up hope,” Beaumont said. “We’re just taking tomorrow as another opportunity to continue to grow and improve. It would be so easy for us to fall apart right now and not stay together, but I give credit to the people in the locker room for staying together as one unit, the best we can.”

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This article originally appeared on the Indianapolis Star: Indiana vs. Ohio State women’s basketball score, Big Ten record, today’s stats