"Greenspan asked if he should just cancel the whole season," one source said. "And the player told him 'We don't care what you do. But if Sampson ain't coaching, we ain't playing.' And then they just walked out."
If ever a group of people took inspiration from the movies Hoosiers and Animal House and more effectively crammed it down someone's mug, I've never seen it before. My guess is DJ White uttered the above quote. And did he ever channel his inner Otter Stratton...
I remember well the fiasco that resulted from the poor leadership at IU in the hiring of Mike Davis. They let political correctness, and more specifically, the players dictate their decision making. Were they right? Of course not. And IU basketball suffered greatly.
Now they are faced with a similar ultimatum. What now? Are the players being reasonable or responsible? Hell no. Could this put IU basketball in the hurt-locker for several years? Absolutely. I'm of the belief though that in order to truly get on the track to recovery, you've got to hit rock bottom. And from the looks of things, if the players follow through on their threat, IU basketball will be staring the Mariana Trench right in the face. If IU's leaders didn't have such a history of incompetence then I'd be inclined to tell the players they can go to hell, but that just isn't the case. I will acknowledge that the players boycotting games is asinine. Calling HPER Court 1, HPER Court 1 do you copy?
A boycott would obviously destroy this season, which by the team's recent performance suggests a possible conference title and decent tourney run. But if these players do follow through, the end result will be a colonoscopy to the Indiana leadership hierarchy the likes of which never seen before.
