My Two Cents: With Johnson Out, It's Hood-Schifino's Show Every Possible Minute Now

Freshman guard Jalen Hood-Schifino is mature beyond his years, but the pressure's on now that Xavier Johnson is out after foot surgery. It's Hood-Schifino's team now, and he has to run the show when the Hoosiers dive deep into the Big Ten schedule in January.

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Back in early September, I ran into Xavier Johnson and had a chance to have a long chat with Indiana's veteran point guard. Like all curious minds, I wanted to know all about freshman guard Jalen Hood-Schifino, and how he had looked all summer.

Johnson, who was starting his fifth year of college basketball, couldn't stop raving about the 6-foot-6 point guard who won two high school national championships at Montverde Academy in Florida. He was a huge addition to this program, Johnson said.

Johnson went on and on about how the two of them had played together most of the time during workouts, which was something as a surprise. Those who worried about Hood-Schifino's perimeter shooting ''shouldn't be,'' Johnson said. 

Playing two point guards at once gave Indiana coach Mike Woodson many more options. As a tandem, especially with big man Trayce Jackson-Davis returning, it gave Indiana's offense a fresh and dangerous look.

Indiana coach Mike Woodson has plenty of faith in freshman point guad Jalen Hood-Schifino. (USA TODAY Sports)

Hood-Schifino's arrival solved another problem. He and Johnson now had Indiana's point guard slot covered for a full 40 minutes a game, something that's been a major issue for the past half-dozen years. That's been a huge plus. Woodson has started them together in every game they've both been healthy, then they sub in and out for each other at the point the rest of the time.

But the real excitement level was going to be watching them both play together. Sadly, though, we haven't been able to see much of that through the first 13 games, mostly because of injury, but also because of foul trouble and blowout wins late where they didn't need to play together in the second half.

Hood-Schifino missed three games with a back injury, and now Johnson is out with a foot injury that required surgery. He hurt it early in the Kansas game on Dec, 17, which leads to an amazing stat, one that will only get worse until Johnson returns, whenever that may be. Sometime in February seems to be the best-case scenario.

So far, in the 520 minutes that Indiana has played while going 10-3, Hood-Schifino and Johnson have been on the floor together a grand total of 97 minutes and 42 seconds. That's just 18.8 percent of the total minutes played so far.

And that's too bad.

I went back through the play-by-play from all 13 games, and here's what's going on so far with pairing the two of them together. These are the total minutes played together in each game so far:

• NONE (5) — Kennesaw State and Elon (Johnson out), Rutgers, Nebraska and Arizona (Hood-Schifino out).
• KANSAS on Dec. 17 (6:09): Both started, played first 6:09 to start the game before Hood-Schifino sat down. Johnson injured a few minutes later, and did not return.
• NORTH CAROLINA on Nov. 30 (30:12): In Indiana's best performance of the year, they played the first 6:43 of the first half together, and then the  final 7:20 of first half, In the second half, they played the first 6:36, and the final 7:33. It was their most minutes together by far.
• JACKSON STATE on Nov. 25 (11:53): They played the first 5:44 of the first half, and that’s all. They played the first 6:09 second half, but that was it.
• LITTLE ROCK on Nov. 23 (17:39):  They played the first 6:18 first half, and the last 5:07. They played the first 5:25 of the second half together, then just 49 seconds after that.
• MIAMI of OHIO on Nov. 20 (9:06): They played the first 6:33 of the first half, plus another 54 seconds. They played the first 1:42 of the second half, but that was all. 
• XAVIER on Nov. 18 (18:04): Played the first 6:53 of the first half, then 4:18 to end the half. They played the first 2:44 of the second half, then a 1:07 run and another 52 seconds, then the final 2:10 of the game. 
• BETHUNE-COOKMAN on Nov. 10 (14:42): They played the first 6:31 of the first half, and the final 3:11. They played the first 5:00 of the second half, but that was it. 
• MOREHEAD STATE on Nov. 7 (13:35): They played the first 7:19 of the first half, and the first 6:16 of the second half

All of this is important because as Indiana heads into the 18-game Big Ten grind, there's going to be a ton of pressure on Hood-Schifino with Johnson not around. This is his team now, and he needs to run it.

Here's perfect capable, so we'll see how it goes. Tamar Bates and Trey Galloway really have to step up too, especially when Hood-Schifino needs a blow. 

"Guys are going to have to step up, because we're a little shorthanded,'' Woodson said. "Tamar is starting to figure it out. He's done some good things for us throughout the 13 games that we've played. It's just that his minutes now are going to increase because we're going to need him to step up and play and make plays for us."

Woodson and his staff have spent plenty of time with Galloway handling the ball, but he can't break pressure on his own like Johnson and Hood-Schifino can. Bates is really a pure two-guard, too. He and Hood-Schifino are dangerous together offensively, with Bates getting 19 in the 69-55 win over Kennesaw State on Friday night, and Hood-Schifino getting 18. 

Bates was knocking down threes, and Hood-Schifino had five buckets with hard drives to the rim. 

"We opened the floor up a little bit to get Schifino some room to work with the basketball, as well as Gallo,'' Woodson said. "Tamar was on the back end of a lot of it, getting shots.

"I ran a few things for Tamar to get shots, and he delivered for us. I thought Miller's shot coming down the stretch was one of the biggest shots of the game as well to give us a little bigger cushion to secure the win. It was a total team effort. We just kind of opened the floor up a little bit offensively."

Indiana's Jalen Hood-Schifino (1) will get the bulk of the point guard minutes going forward (USA TODAY Sports)

Hood-Schifino is mature beyond his years, and he doesn't get flustered. But Big Ten games — especially on the road — are different animals. He'll need to be huge for Indiana to win at Iowa, Penn State, Illinois, Minnesota and Maryland in January.

Those are all winnable games for a team with Big Ten title aspirations, but they're going to need to play at a high level to do that. That's going to start with Hood-Schifino, who's going to have his hands on the ball a lot.

Jackson-Davis, Indiana's best player, has missed the last two games with a presumed back injury. (Indiana didn't announce anything, but he had a back issue earlier.) The plan is to have him back in about two weeks when the Hoosiers play at Iowa on Jan. 5.

Having a healthy Jackson-Davis dominate the way he can will make life easier for everyone.

"We've got to get some healthy bodies back. That will help,'' Woodson said. "I mean, the way teams are playing us, when we had Trayce — hopefully he'll be back after the break — they were doubling. That's not going to change. 

"Guys have to be able to make shots on the perimeter, it's just that simple if we're posting the ball some. They doubled Race (Thompson) tonight. We got good looks and guys knocked some shots down, which we needed. That's what's going to have to happen as we continue."

Indiana guard Jalen Hood-Schifino listens to coach Mike Woodson on the sidelines (USA TODAY Sports)

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