With the lead scorer Cody Zeller's outstanding performance, the No. 1 Indiana Hoosiers registered a comprehensive victory over the formidable North Dakota State Bison 87-61 in the first round of the Progressive Legends Classic.
Zeller played brilliantly and scored 22 points and grabbed nine rebounds. Remy Abell and Jeremy Hollowell supported him by adding 14 points each.
''Your fundamentals, your technique, all your experiences, all those things are really, really important, but there's nothing bigger than energy and toughness. It's got to be there constantly,'' The Associated Press quoted Indiana coach Tom Crean as saying. ''Once we got that figured out tonight and we had some guys that figured it out from the beginning, but we didn't have a team of guys that figured it out from the beginning, and once we did, I thought we played pretty well.''
North Dakota State played very well in the beginning against No. 1 Indiana, who won their last two games and are considered one of the strongest teams in the college basketball world.
But on Monday night, their outside shooters were not accurate from the 3-point arc. In the first half they could manage only 4 of 11 and in the second half only 1 of 2.
''There's conventional, there's unconventional and then there's tonight,'' Crean said. ''We need to do the same thing next Monday and Tuesday. We've got to do the same thing against Ball State and North Carolina. It makes no difference.''
Crean had reasons to be cautious against North Dakota as he hasn't forgotten how they defeated No. 8 Marquette 64-60 unexpectedly to clinch the Golden Eagles' tourney trophy. That's the reason why he instructed his team to play carefully against the North Dakota and never take them lightly.
''We're going to see everything from different teams this year,'' Zeller said. ''I know they're going to try different strategies, that they're going to try to out-physical me, out-physical some of our other guys, try to get us in foul trouble, so you've just got to keep your composure and keep on working.''
Young guns Abell and Hollowell played mesmerizing basketball in the second half, to ensure a comprehensive victory for their team. Abell hit three 3-pointers to finish with his career high score and Hollowell scored 14 points in only 19 minutes.
''We had some fight in us, but we expect to have fight in us,'' Bison coach Saul Phillips said. ''It's amazing to me, they just kept coming at us in waves. Eventually, they leaned at us and a leg went out.''
Marshall Bjorklund was lead scorer for the Bison; he scored 16 points and grabbed 6 rebounds. Mike Felt added 11 points.
Crean made it clear to the Indiana players that they will have to perform better on Thursday night when they face Sam Houston.
''If we're going to be successful, we've got to have a group of guys where there's very little drop off when we got to the bench,'' Crean said. ''Tonight, we just played.''
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