Indiana basketball star exposes team’s toxic fan problem

Indiana basketball can’t win until the fans grow up, and Oumar Ballo’s comments prove it.

Indiana men’s basketball has had a nightmare season, and now their postseason fate rests in the hands of the NCAA tournament selection committee. The Hoosiers are out of the Big Ten tournament after a humiliating 72-59 loss to the Oregon Ducks on Thursday afternoon. The Ducks ran away with the game despite an 11 a.m. tip-off that felt like 9 a.m. for players coming from the West Coast. Indiana was projected as one of the last four teams into the 2025 NCAA tournament field before the game, but it’s hard to feel good about their status after the loss.

Indiana is already looking for its next head coach. The program announced a mutual parting of ways with Mike Woodson earlier this season after a year that saw Indiana spend big money in the transfer portal but fail to get the results they were hoping for. Woodson made the NCAA tournament in each of his first two seasons, but he missed the 2024 tournament and finds himself on the bubble this year. Hoosiers fans were notoriously tough on Woodson for failing to live up to their expectations, but the reality is that Indiana basketball has been down for a long time.

Indiana certainly spent money in NIL this past offseason. Big man Oumar Ballo was the crown jewel of Woodson’s transfer portal haul, reportedly getting $1.2 million to transfer in from Arizona. Myles Rice and Kanaan Carlyle were two more pricey additions in the backcourt, but the pieces never fit. Ballo had another productive season of interior scoring, but Indiana failed to put enough shooting around him, and ultimately looked like a disjointed team throughout the year. For as much heat as Woodson felt this season, it was even worse for the players.

Ballo talked to the media about his Indiana experience after the game, and revealed the harsh interactions he had with the Hoosier fans throughout the year. “The fans’ act let us down as a whole unit.” Ballo said in a viral interview. “We lose one game, two games, and next thing you know your DMs are crazy. Death wishes, death threats. No one wants to live like that.”

Watch Ballo’s full interview here.

This is disgusting behavior from the Indiana fans, but sadly it isn’t too surprising. Ballo went out of his way to say this isn’t the “true fans,” but rather the trolls who can’t come to terms with the true state of Indiana basketball.

Indiana has only advanced out of the first weekend of the NCAA tournament once in the last 11 years, but many around the fanbase act like the team should be competing for a national championship every season. The heyday of Bobby Knight is long gone at this point. Indiana is a lot closer to a ‘one coach program’ than it is a real blueblood. The program hasn’t been to the Final Four since 2002, and it hasn’t won a national championship since 1987. Hoosiers fans should be cool with Woodson leaving the program better than he found it by building some competitive teams in a challenging landscape, but instead they had immense hostility for the players and coaching staff during a trying season.

Indiana fans’ dreams of landing someone like Brad Stevens are totally delusional. Why would he leave a fantastic job leading the Boston Celtics front office to step into the pressure cooker in Bloomington? Michigan coach Dusty May has no interest in going back to his alma mater right now, either. Heck, Indiana can’t even get someone like Iowa State coach TJ Otzelberger. At this point, they should be lucky if they can get someone like Drake coach Ben McCollum, who was coaching at the DII level just last year.

The Hoosiers have tons of money to spend, but the culture around the program is so toxic that it doesn’t feel like a good job. The boosters and alums who hold unreasonable expectations and exert a suffocating amount of pressure need to look in the mirror. Ballo’s comments should be humiliating for anyone who cheers for the program. Hopefully, it will lead to better behavior in the future.

The coach who can turn around Indiana basketball would be treated like a king, but the program is so far away from getting there. Before it can win, Indiana needs to start respecting itself and its players. Ballo’s comments show they are still nowhere close.