YouTube Gold: Duke-Indiana 1992

As Indiana continues its coaching search it’s coming up against a painful truth: most of the rest of the world doesn’t see Indiana as the great job that folks in the Hoosier state believe it to be.

A lot of people imagined that the job would lure plenty of big names and maybe it has. But not Rick Pitino, apparently not Chris Beard and certainly not Brad Stevens.

Porter Moser and Scott Drew’s names have come up but we have no idea if that’s serious. We hope they find the right guy, whoever that might be.

Of course it wasn’t always this way. Bob Knight led Indiana to two spectacular seasons in 1974-75 and 1975-76, with the Hoosiers losing only one game in those two years (when Scott May was injured) and running the table the next to become the last undefeated champions.

Imagine if Larry Bird hadn’t left, because he was there for a semester in 1975.

Knight alternated between volatility and brilliance throughout his career and while he had some major lows, he also had some stunning success, ultimately winning three titles.

However, 1992 was not to be one of those years.

Indiana ran into Duke’s great ‘92 team with Christian Laettner, Grant Hill and Bobby Hurley and while it was a tight game, Duke prevailed 81-78 and then went on to play the Fab Five in the championship.

This game also marked the public acknowledgment of the estrangement between Knight and his former protege Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, a rift that took years to repair. Watch how Knight nearly ignores Coach K after the buzzer.

We’ve seen echoes of this in Knight’s long separation from Indiana, a rift only recently healed.

Also, Calbert Cheaney played for Indiana in this game. He’s now been mentioned as one fo the possible candidates for the Indiana job.