Tag: Indiana

Social media reacts to passing of college basketball legend Bob Knight

RIP to a legend.

You can probably count on one hand how many coaches in any sport ever drew the attention that one Bobby Knight did.

You can also count on one hand how many college basketball coaches have ever been as successful as Knight.

The legendary college basketball coach that led Indiana University to three national championships (1976, 1981, and 1987) died on Tuesday.  He was 83 years old.

Knight’s story is about as complex as it gets.

On one hand he was as successful of college basketball coach as we’ve seen.  He clearly believed in the “student” part of student athlete as he constantly graduated his players while competing for the highest of stakes.

His story also can’t be told without mentioning the controversies and there were plenty that led ultimately led to his firing in the fall of 2000.

As you can expect, when news of his passing broke on Tuesday the college basketball world shared their thoughts and memories, including Notre Dame head coach Micha Shrewsberry.  See that and plenty of more reaction below.

Legendary coach Bob Knight dies at 83

Rest in peace, Coach.

Basketball Hall of Fame coach Bob Knight has died at the age of 83. In 42 seasons coaching college basketball, Knight accumulated 902 wins, the sixth-most of all-time. He made 28 NCAA Tournaments and came away from three of his five Final Fours with national championships, all of them with Indiana.

Notre Dame was a regular opponent of Knight’s Hoosiers, who asserted their dominance in the series with 21-6 record during those years. However, the Irish won their first game against Knight in the 1968 NIT, when he was coaching Army.

The Irish also were witnesses to one of the many incidents Knight was involved in during his career. In a 1993 game between the teams, he screamed at and kicked his son, Pat, and subsequently was suspended for one game.

In 2010, two years after Knight coached the final game of his career for Texas Tech, he got in some digs at Notre Dame during a public speaking engagement. He began by referring to Sam Perkins and fellow Hall of Famer Chris Mullin, two players he coached to the gold medal in the 1984 Olympics:

“They were two smart Catholic boys. They should advise Notre Dame to go in the Big Ten, because there are some dumb Catholic boys up there. They have no idea how much it would change their recruiting.”

Since then, of course, Notre Dame has joined the Big Ten for hockey and the ACC for all other sports but remained independent in football. Still, that had to have ruffled a few feathers in South Bend at the time.

In spite of everything, Knight accomplished a lot in his career and deserves to be celebrated for it. May he rest in peace.

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Follow Geoffrey on Twitter: @gfclark89

Chargers’ Raheem Layne out for season with torn ACL

The Chargers lost a key special teamer for the remainder of the season.

Chargers safety Raheem Layne suffered a torn ACL in the loss to the Cowboys on Monday night, head coach Brandon Staley confirmed.

“Raheem is one of our top special teams players,” Staley said. “This is a tough moment for him, but he’ll be back. He’s proven himself in two years that he can play in the league.”

Layne went down with the injury in the third quarter on a punt play and never returned to the game.

Signed as an undrafted free agent out of Indiana last year, Layne appeared in 11 games with one start, which came in Week 4 against the Raiders. He posted seven tackles.

While he did not play much defense, Layne was a core special teamer.

What the experts are predicting: Notre Dame vs. USC

See who thinks the Irish have a chance.

Notre Dame really needs to find a way to beat USC. The national title hopes are gone, but this could be key in determining the direction of the program. Win, and everything will seem fine, at least for one night. Lose, and even more questions will be raised.

Here are the prognostications from some college football experts:

Jaida Thomas scores first goal in 2023 versus Indiana

Lady Vols’ Jaida Thomas scores first goal in 2023 versus Indiana.

Tennessee (3-1-1, 0-0 SEC) and Indiana (3-0-2, 0-0 Big Ten) tied, 2-2, Thursday at Regal Soccer Stadium.

The Hoosiers led, 2-0, at halftime, scoring two goals in a 30-second span.

Paige Webber and Sophia Black scored for Indiana in the 34th minute.

Kameron Simmonds scored for the Lady Vols in 53rd minute, her fifth goal this season. Macaira Midgley was credited with an assist.

Tennessee tied the match in the 79th minute. Jaida Thomas her first goal of the season, while Ally Brown recorded an assist.

Tennessee outshot the Hoosiers, 28-6. The Lady Vols recorded eight shots on goal, while Indiana had five shots land on target.

Questions we want to see Ohio State football answer against Indiana

Here are some questions we want answers for on Saturday. What are yours that you want to see the Buckeyes answer? #GoBucks

Unlike many seasons for Ohio State football, there are more than a few questions surround it’s team this fall.

Many of the questions are fairly obvious, but they’re still without answers that we all want to find out about. What the start of the season brings is an opportunity for the Buckeyes to give us those answers.

Although my questions might not be exactly what yours are, we probably have at least a few of the same one’s heading into Indiana. Find out below what my questions surrounding this Ohio State team are, and hopefully, we get some answers for them by the time Saturday evening rolls around.

Big Game Boomer: Notre Dame biggest college brand in…Illinois?

Not sure we agree with this.

It’s no secret that a large portion of Notre Dame’s fan base is in the Chicago area. That’s reflected by the fact that every writer on this site is based there. But is that reflective of the state of Illinois as a whole?

Big Game Boomer, a top college sports list and graph aficionado on social media, has been mentioned on here many times before. His latest entry as of this writing is a U.S. map that lists the biggest college brand by state. Notre Dame is listed for Illinois and the only school not located in the state it represents:

Inevitably, someone asked about this, and he was quick to respond:

And when asked why Indiana doesn’t have Notre Dame, he said this:

The first event I covered on location for this site was the now-defunct Crossroads Classic in Indianapolis. Even though the Irish were the designated home team, the crowd at Bankers Life Fieldhouse was heavily for the Hoosiers. So the statement about the Hoosiers owning the Hoosier State is not wrong.

Still, as nice as it is to see Notre Dame represented on this map, it’s hard to call it the best college brand in the Land of Lincoln. Sure, Northern Illinois is too small for consideration, and everyone is distancing themselves from Northwestern right now, but what about Illinois? While the Illini football program has done little to help the brand lately, it’s a little unfair to discount those fans.

Anyone who lives in Illinois knows that the further south you go, the more you’ll find people who don’t care for Chicago. I won’t go into the reasons for that here, but this is one case where Chicago probably shouldn’t represent the whole state.

Illini fans reign supreme throughout Illinois, and one merely needs to travel throughout to find them. They are proud, and they are passionate about their team. Many of them still are mourning the loss of Chief Illiniwek as an official university symbol.

So as nice as it is to have Notre Dame as Illinois’ representative on this map, it really should be a school from Illinois. And Illini fans probably are most deserving to represent the state. After all, Chicago is a pro sports town first, so it should not be taken into account when making a map like this. Consider the rest of the state please next time, Big Game Boomer.

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Follow Geoffrey on Twitter: @gfclark89

Chargers’ Raheem Layne making splash plays early in training camp

Raheem Layne could push himself up the safety depth chart if he continues to make plays.

There is a battle in Chargers training camp for the fourth spot at the safety position, and second-year Raheem Layne is making his case early on to secure it.

Layne logged a pass deflection and the first turnover of camp in team drills. He was covering tight end Michael Ezeike and as quarterback Easton Stick passed, Layne read it perfectly and came away with the football.

Around this time last year, Layne was also making plays. The former undrafted free agent out of Indiana made the most of his opportunities while Derwin James and Mark Webb were out, earning him a roster spot.

Layne rarely saw the defensive side of the ball in his rookie campaign, but he made his money on special teams.

As it stands, Derwin James and Alohi Gilman are slated to be the starting safeties, with last year’s third-round pick JT Woods as the third safety coming on in dime (six defensive back) packages.

Woods struggled in his rookie season, but the coaches expect him to make a leap. However, if Layne continues to make plays, he could end up warranting that third spot, which is a vital role in Brandon Staley’s defense.

A cornerback-to-safety convert, Layne has excellent instincts in coverage, experience in multiple alignments and good run defense to be a solid contributor on defense.

ChatGPT ranks top 10 running backs in Notre Dame history

How do you feel about this list?

We recently put AI writing tool ChatGPT to the test and had it list what it believed was Notre Dame’s top 10 quarterbacks. The list surely caused some debate for some readers, but guess what? We’re going to cause you to think again by having it generate its list of the top 10 running backs in program history.

Some of you might disagree with what ChatGPT says, and others might even say the list is too short. However, the point of this is to make you think and spark discussion. Also, even though ChatGPT has not been updated since September 2021, it’s a safe assumption that no one on the Irish since then has played well enough to have a place on this list with the possible exception of [autotag]Kyren Williams[/autotag]. Just out of curiosity though, would you include him?

Anyway, without further adieu, here’s the list with ChatGPT’s descriptions of each player. Some entries have been edited for clarity and updates:

2024 four-star shooting guard recruit lists Notre Dame among top eight

Think he’ll choose the Irish?

Notre Dame will need shooting and lots of it when the time comes for the program to be competitive again. So it surely must have been good news for [autotag]Micah Shrewsberry[/autotag] and his staff when 2024 four-star shooting guard recruit Austin Swartz told Joe Tipton of On3 that Notre Dame is one of eight finalists for his services. Also making the cut are Indiana, Clemson, Miami, Florida State, Virginia Tech, UConn and Georgia.

Swartz, one of the top 2024 recruits in North Carolina, has scheduled official visits to six of the above schools, but Notre Dame is not one of them. In fact, he already has visited Clemson, and every other school is on his official visit list. It’s unknown whether he’ll make any trips to South Bend, so we’re left to speculate just how serious he is about the Irish. Hopefully, their chances aren’t dead before they’ve actually gotten any life.

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Contact/Follow us @IrishWireND on Twitter, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Notre Dame news, notes, and opinions.

Follow Geoffrey on Twitter: @gfclark89