But what will likely go down as a transformational group, or at least an incredibly successful one, is thinning out.
NIGHT CHANGES TAB FULL
He is not the last member of his recruiting class - 2018, Allen’s first full cycle in Bloomington - to leave IU. Sunday night brought the biggest outgoing bombshell, when Michael Penix confirmed his intention to transfer. Those two defensive line transfers, LeDarrius Cox and Patrick Lucas, bolster a position group that’s been dealt a handful of departures (and will graduate two or three key members as well). UNC transfer Emery Simmons reinforces a receiver corps that’s seen Miles Marshall, Jacolby Hewitt, Da’Shaun Brown and Jordyn Williams hit the portal. They need to, in part because the portal has pulled its share of players out of Bloomington as well. The Hoosiers have more irons in the raging transfer fire as well. Two defensive linemen from Ole Miss, a linebacker from Miami and a wide receiver from North Carolina all reinforce up positions that need depth, and could probably use fresh faces and fresh ideas. If that is at all true, then Allen’s roster approach right now makes sense. That at some level, when things got difficult and injuries piled up, this roster struggled to find the same inspiration to dig deep and fight back to sustain their respect they had once found to fight for it. This season, continuing another of his preferred methods, Allen announced the word he wanted to define his team’s mentality across the course of the fall was “chase.” It is easy to say with hindsight, but it felt at times perhaps like the Hoosiers believed they had caught. And the results were undeniable: back-to-back January bowls in Florida, for a program that had never attended one in its history before that. It was derided at times as overly cliché, but for the people to whom it needed to matter - players, coaches, parents - it did. His “love each other” approach to everything from roster construction to community service appealed so far and so wide that NFL coaches who had never met Allen still wanted to know more about how and why it worked. More than anything, he needs to hold tightly to his convictions as he does.Īllen’s patience and positivity captured the curiosity of college football in 20.
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Don't let injuries be his legacy.Īnatomy of a disaster: What went wrong for IU football in failed 2021 season?Īs he renovates his program, Allen is moving quickly. Insider: Michael Penix achieved much of what he aimed to at IU. In that context, the makeover Allen has embarked upon doesn’t just make sense. It was the most - though certainly not the last - substantial movement we’ve seen from Indiana since the end of its enormously disappointing 2021 season, which saw the Hoosiers ranked in the preseason for the first time in a half-century only to wind up 2-10 and winless in Big Ten play.
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The Hoosiers landed four transfers out of the portal between Friday-Sunday, said goodbye to their starting quarterback as he went into the portal and, late Sunday night, settled on former UMass head coach Walt Bell as Nick Sheridan’s replacement at offensive coordinator.
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Time will tell whether it was time well spent. BLOOMINGTON – Tom Allen, diving headlong into the task of fixing his malfunctioning football program, had a busy 72 hours this weekend.