Indiana basketball star exposes team’s toxic fan problem

Indiana men's basketball had a nightmare season. And now their postseason fate is in the hands of the NCAA Tournament Select Committee. The Hoosiers are out of the Big Ten tournament after a 72-59 defeat that humiliated the Oregon duck on Thursday afternoon. The duck felt like 9am for players coming from the West Coast despite a tip-off at 11am. Indiana was projected as one of the last four teams on 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 the next head coach. The program announced mutual farewells with Mike Woodson this season, a year after Indiana spent a lot of money on the transfer portal but failed to get the results they wanted. Woodson played NCAA tournaments in each of his first two seasons, but he missed the 2024 tournament and fell into the bubble this year. Hoosiers fans were well known for not being able to live up to their expectations at Woodson, but the reality is that Indiana basketball has been down for a long time.

Indiana certainly wasn't the offseason of the past. Big Man Oumar Ballo is the crown jewel of Woodson's transfer portal hauling, and reportedly won $1.2 million for transfers from Arizona. Miles Rice and Canaan Carlisle were even more expensive additions in the backcourt, but the pieces never matched. Although Baro had another productive season of interior scoring, Indiana was unable to shoot enough around him, eventually looking like a disjointed team throughout the year. It's gotten even worse for the players because of the same heat that Woodson felt this season.

Baro spoke to the media about his post-match Indiana experiences, revealing harsh interactions with Hoosier fans throughout the year. “The fan's actions disappointed us as a whole unit,” Baro said in a viral interview. “We lose one game, two games, then we see that DMS is crazy. Death wish, death threat. No one wants to live that way.”

Check out the full interview with Baro.

This is a disgusting behavior from Indiana fans, but sadly not so surprising. Baro got in the way to say this is not a “true fan” but a troll that cannot agree with the true state of Indiana basketball.

Indiana has advanced from its first weekend of the NCAA Tournament over the past 11 years, but much around the fanbase should have teams competing in national championships every season. Bobby Knight's heyday has long gone by this point. Indiana is much closer to “one coaching program” than the real Blueblood. The program has never been to the Final Four since 2002 and has not won a national championship since 1987. Hoosiers fans need to be better than they found their program by building a competitive team into a challenging landscape, but they had a great hostility towards the players and coaching staff during the ordeal season.

The dream of landing someone like Indiana fan Brad Stevens is completely paranoid. Why would he step out of his amazing job leading the Boston Celtics front office and step into the pressure pot of Bloomington? Michigan coach Dusty May is not interested in returning to his alma mater right now. Heck, Indiana, can't even get someone like Iowa coach TJ Otzelberger. At this point, if they can get someone like Drake Coach Ben McCollum, who coached at the DII level last year, they should be lucky.

Hoosiers has a lot of money, but the culture around the program is so toxic that it doesn't feel like a good job. Boosters and alumni who have irrational expectations and put pressure on the amount of choking to look in the mirror. Baro's comments must be humiliating to anyone supporting the program. Hopefully, it will lead to better behavior in the future.

Coaches who can look back at Indiana basketball are treated like kings, but the program is far from getting there. Before that wins, Indiana needs to start to respect itself and its players. Baro's comments show that they are still close to nowhere.