My Two Cents: It's All Good When You Make the Shots That Matter

Indiana guards Xavier Johnson and Rob Phinisee were having poor shooting days, right up until they both made huge shots down the stretch to clinch a win over Notre Dame on Saturday. And Parker Stewart just keeps on making threes, making the Hoosiers' offense so much better.

Tom Brew | Dec 19, 2021

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. — Former Indiana guard Devonte Green never met a shot he didn't like. He made a lot of them, missed even more and drove a fan base crazy from 2016 to 2020.

It was a love/hate relationship — and that ran both ways. He was a Tom Crean recruit, and an Archie Miller player for three years, and he never once got to play in an NCAA Tournament game.

His biggest regret now? That he didn't get to play for Mike Woodson at Indiana.

"Boy if I got to play for Coach Woody ...'' he tweeted a few weeks back. It would have been quite a match.

Boy if I got to play for Coach Woody…😮‍💨
— Devonté Green (@ChefBoyArGreen) December 4, 2021

Indiana star Trayce Jackson-Davis, Green's teammate during his first year at Indiana, fired right back at Green. "He gets mad if you don't shoot it. You wouldve been in heaven lol

He gets mad if you dont shoot it 😂😂 You wouldve been in heaven lol https://t.co/92ixetlSg8
— TJD (@TrayceJackson) December 5, 2021

Both, of course, are exactly right. Since the day he got here last March, Woodson has been imploring and pleading with his players to shoot the ball. He inherited a fragile and broken team from Miller, with confidence at an all-time low. Woodson's defensive preachings have all been accepted well, and Indiana is already a very good defensive team — second in the nation, if fact, in field goal percentage defense (34.8 percent).

Being great on offense has been another matter all together. As a whole, Indiana wasn't great offensively on Saturday either, but just when they seemed on the verge of blowing another lead like they did two weeks ago at Wisconsin, they started knocking down shots at the most critical times.

That's winning basketball.

Notre Dame guard Blake Wesley (0) shoots the ball while Indiana Hoosiers guard Xavier Johnson (0) defends in the first half Saturday. (Trevor Ruszkowski/USA TODAY Sports)

Shooters with short memories

After Notre Dame had made its second-half run and erased the Hoosiers' 10-point lead, the pressure was Indiana to rally back and close this game out. They needed a win in the worst way, and they had to make plays to do it.

And make shots to do it.

Senior guard Rob Phinisee, who played 25 minutes off the bench more for his defensive prowess, hit a massive three to put Indiana up 52-47 with 4:27 left. He had been 1-for-6 shooting before that.

Starting point guard Xavier Johnson followed that with a jumper to stretch the lead to seven. He had been 2-for-10 shooting before that.

And that's saying something.

One of the toughest things to do in basketball is make a shot at crunch time when you haven't been making them all night. It's hard to see it, and hard to visualize it, going in. But Woodson's prodding and pushing, maybe — just maybe — it's starting to sink in for those two, Johnson and Phinisee.

"I was just happy to see some shots go in, period,'' Woodson said. " You know, I thought we struggled really early in the game and just couldn't make shots, but our defense was just tight. I was struggling to find offense tonight, but we made the plays down the stretch that we needed to make in terms of securing the game.

"We've improved, but we're still a work in progress with our point guards, and it's OK. Hey, it's the toughest position on the floor, and I'm demanding. I'm going to keep pushing these guys to get better because I know if they do, we're going to be better as a ball club. We'll benefit from it. They're all still trying to learn what we're trying to do. They're searching, man, and I've just got to help them more somehow.''

Woodson is right, of course, He holds his point guards to a high standard, and that goes back a long way because Hall of Famer Isiah Thomas was his point guard during his last year as a player at Indiana.

'It's not a stretch, I don't think, to say that when Johnson and Phinisee play well, Indiana is going to win a lot of games. And if they don't? Well, it might oftentimes be the difference between winning and losing. It's the nature of the position.

Because what we know for sure is that Trayce Jackson-Davis is a great interior player, and fellow forward Race Thompson has raised his game as well.

And what we're also learning is that Parker Stewart is showing up every night, and hitting shots.

That's so important.

Indiana guard Parker Stewart (left) blocks the shot of Notre Dame guard Dane Goodwin. (Trevor Ruszkowski/USA TODAY Sports)

A silent assassin from deep

Parker Stewart was 3-for-4 from three-point range against Notre Dame, and finished with 12 points. And after a rough stretch early in the season — where he missed 10 straight shots after making his first two — he's shooting nearly 56 percent from three since then.

"He has been very important for us,'' Woodson said of Stewart, who transferred to Indiana last January and decided to stick around after the coaching change. "Early on when we first started this journey, I didn't know where the three-point shooting was going to come from, and Parker and Miller (Kopp) both have stepped up and made some threes for us.

"But I don't want to be a team to just live on three-point shots. If you got it, you know, hey, take it. I mean, if it's there. But I think our strength is playing inside-out with our big guys, and that's been good for us. I don't want to stray away from that.''

His teammates understand Stewart's value very well. He doesn't talk much in public, which is totally fine, because he does all his talking on the court. For an Indiana team that has struggled to shoot for years, he's been a breath of fresh air.

"Parker is one of the most gracious guys on our team,'' said Jackson-Davis, who had 17 points Saturday. "We all love him, and we know when he is out on the floor, we know exactly where he is at all times. We try to find him, and for some reason, teams keep leaving him. We're going to feed him shots, and he is going to hit those shots. You've have seen it. We're going to keep feeding him.''

After a slow start, Stewart has hit 25-of-45 threes, a 55.6 percentage. That's awesome. And as the Hoosiers continue to get more and more comfortable with attacking double teams on Jackson-Davis in the post, Stewart is going to continue to get good looks.

"Trusting the offense and staying patient has allowed my shots to come, I think,'' Stewart said after Saturday's win. "Trayce is a very unselfish player and I know when teams throw different defenses at him, that opens up things for me as well as everybody else.''

Stewart picked Indiana last winter during one of the most difficult times in his life after his father and college coach, Anthony Stewart, had died suddenly from a heart attack. They played together at UT-Martin, and he showed up in Bloomington last spring but wasn't ready to play. He was still grieving, and needed the time to adapt. That's a lot to go through.

He spent a lot of that time in the gym, putting up shots. That was his therapy.

"The time I had off last year, I was focusing on recovering from injuries and getting myself back together mentally after my dad passed,'' Stewart said. "But my dad always taught me to prepare myself the right way, so I think getting extra shots up every day and continuing to lock in on defense has helped this season, along with having great teammates that I know are with me through the ups and downs.''

Having guys knock down shots on the perimeter really can make this offense dangerous. Race Thompson said exactly that, that defenses can no longer sag inside on him and Jackson-Davis.

"It makes it easier for us both. It's hard for other teams to dig on me and Trayce because if they do, me and Trayce are completely comfortable and unselfish enough to throw the ball out and have confidence in our teammates to shoot the ball.

"Even tonight, when they're going under on X, and sure, he shot 2-for-9 from 3-point, but, again, I would tell him to shoot the 10th one because he can make that shot. Definitely just having that outside threat makes it easier for us to do what we want to do, and then if we get hard digs, we'll kick it out, and they'll knock it down.''

That happened down the stretch Saturday, at a time when the Hoosiers really needed it.

Ready for the Big Ten? I think so.

Shooters with short memories

A silent assassin from deep

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