Numbers That Matter: 2024 Indiana Football Spring Game

Image: Indiana University Athletics

Written By: Evan Alvarez

Numbers drive so much in today’s world and the sports world is no different. Now more than ever teams are hiring and building analytics teams to get every edge possible over their opponents. Over the course of the season, we’ll look into many of those numbers ahead of the Hoosiers’ matchups each week, so be on the lookout for that. For the Spring Game coming up on Thursday, April 18, however, we don’t have many numbers or stats to look at yet! So, we can have a bit of fun. Let’s get into it:

80,000

This is the attendance number that IU’s in-conference foe, The Ohio State Buckeyes, drew for their Spring Game. Memorial Stadium literally cannot hold that amount of people, so we can’t expect to see 80,000, but how many fans show up on Thursday? There’s arguably never been more excitement and momentum for the football program besides a couple years over the past two decades. With IU basketball struggling this season, do fans and alumni jump on the football train? My personal opinion: 20,000 is a gigantic, incredible, amazing win, 10,000 is great and would likely exceed expectations, and ~5,000 is a solid projection for what might actually happen while still hedging and leaving room to exceed expectations. 

8:33 PM and 50%

On Thursday, the sun is estimated to set at 8:33 PM, leading to temperatures in the 50’s and 60’s. Couple that with (as of this writing) a 50% chance of rain in the night time, and those attendance figures above start to look a bit lofty. One major plus is that Bloomington, Indiana is in the Midwest and as many of our readers know, the weather can change in minutes, sometimes even seconds, in this area. Let’s hope for good news over the next couple of days weather wise as this will assist in injury prevention as well.

0

Speaking of injury prevention, if the IU football team leaves the Spring Game this Thursday with zero injuries, it will be an undeniably massive success - regardless of how the actual team looks on the field. That’s how important it is to stay healthy. These reps are important, but the season is still several months away and there’s a lot of time to grow and develop.

9.8

This figure was Brendan Sorsby’s Average Depth of Target (aDOT) during the 2023 season. This stat measures how many yards deep Sorsby’s receivers were upon throwing them the ball. With an entirely new offense (besides a few familiar faces among players and coaches) and a more aggressive approach to throwing the ball, it will be interesting to see where Indiana’s aDOT falls in the 2024 season. While it is extremely unlikely that stats will be logged for public consumption from the Spring Game, I will be on the lookout to see if we look deeper in our targets than in previous years.

44

With Aaron Casey off to the NFL, which player is next in line to have the honor of donning George Taliaferro’s historic #44 during the 2024 season? There are huge shoes to fill when sporting this number and it’s - in my opinion - one of the coolest traditions and greatest honors that Indiana University bestows each year.

22

The Hoosiers will have 22 new transfers on the roster when the spring game kicks off. All 22 won’t participate as a handful are recovering from off season surgeries. Thursday night will be a chance to see which high-impact transfers can make a difference in 2024.

3

Three represents the amount of points the defense will receive during the Spring Game for each stop they earn. The total scoring system for Thursday’s game is as follows:

Touchdown - 6 points

Extra Point - 1 point

Field Goal - 3 points

Turnover Gained - 4 points

Defensive Stop - 3 points

Safety - 2 points

Be sure to follow Hoosier Huddle for exclusive reports, in-depth analyses, and breaking news for all things Indiana University Football this spring and beyond. Hoosier Huddle is the only source dedicated to Hoosiers Football and only Hoosiers Football on the web. Comment below if you plan on attending on Thursday!