'I Played Pitter Patter too Long.' Walt Bell Said After Saturday's Loss

Written by Sammy Jacobs (@Hoosier_Huddle)

“You know, at some point, you got to go be aggressive” Walt Bell said on Monday during his press conference.

The lack of aggressiveness on offense was both the reason IU was in position to take the lead late in the first half and the reason why the Hoosiers only put up three points.

“We want to make it a 60-minute game and especially with kind of the history of this rivalry and how this transpired and we accomplish that but we played pitter-patter too long. I played pitter patter too long.” Bell said.

On multiple occasions Bell mentioned staying in the fight as long as possible, but the Hoosiers need to create explosive plays to win games, not just hang around. However, head coach Tom Allen thought there was more too the struggles than just conservative play calling.

“ It's like anything else. You see what you see, and I feel free to make my comments. But there's also a lot of layers to it.” Allen said. “The one frustrating thing that kind of stuck out to me that really put our offense in a bad spot, we had four crucial penalties that caused us to -- we started four drives inside the 20, three inside the 10, which is tough. It affects play calling. It affects psyche.”

The Hoosiers never found a rhythm on offense and the one or two times they had a chance to be aggressive, Bell pitter pattered around too much. IU only had six “explosion” plays, four of which came in the passing game.

Indiana will host FCS foe Indiana State on Friday night with Tayven Jackson getting the start at quarterback. Both him and Branden Sorsby will play significant snaps, hopefully the training wheels start to come off.

Because at some point you just have to be aggressive on offense.