Indiana football has no answers in loss to one-dimensional Rutgers
BLOOMINGTON — Was Rutgers quarterback Gavin Wimsatt's 80-yard touchdown run early in the fourth quarter the last gasp of the Tom Allen-era?
Time will tell, but it certainly looked to be the nail in the coffin to whatever bowl hopes Indiana football had after losing 31-14 on Saturday. It was the team's third straight loss and dropped their record against FBS opponents to 2-21 going back to the 2021 season.
The Hoosiers got beat (badly) in all three phases and showed little fight in the second half.
Rutgers plays bully ball
Rutgers faced a third and one at midfield on its opening possession of the second half. There was no secret about what was coming next — a handoff to Klye Monangai up the middle. Monangai could have casually strolled up past the line thanks to the push his offensive line got.
The Scarlet Knights were content to eat clock (TONS of clock) and wear IU down one 3- to 4- yard gain at a time, rotating the workload between Monangai and quarterback Gavin Wimsatt.
Their long scoring drives (15-play, 75-yards and 12-plays, 75-yards) ate up nearly 15 minutes of game clock.
Indiana got a couple of stops in the second quarter, but was pushed around for long stretches and struggled bringing Monangai down at the point of contact. He bounced off tacklers and had the strength to move the pile in critical shortage situations.
Wimsett led the team with 143 rushing yards and three touchdowns while Monangai finished the game with 24 carries and 109 yards. Rutgers had 286 rushing yards, the second most IU has given up in the last four seasons.
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When will Dexter Williams be ready?
Indiana’s new starting quarterback Brendan Sorsby threw a 35-yard touchdown to Omar Cooper Jr. on the team’s opening possession with 11:28 to go in the first quarter.
He had two completions over the next 41-plus minutes of play.
Sorsby struggled with the timing and placement of his passes — he nearly had two throws picked off — as the three-and-outs started piling up.
It’s hard to blame the redshirt freshman considering he’s been given a limited amount of practice reps all season long after losing the quarterback competition to Tayven Jackson before a Week 3 game against Louisville. He took over this week and showed all the growing pains you’d expect of a redshirt freshman.
The problem for the Hoosiers is that it’s Week 7 and they were facing an opponent that put a premium on possessions.
Sorsby finished the game 15 of 31 for 136 yards with a pair of touchdowns (one passing).
More: Why Indiana football will have depleted secondary in second half against Rutgers
IU's offensive play calling comes up short
Indiana's homecoming crowd wasn't happy on Saturday with some of the head-scratching decisions from new offensive coordinator Rod Carey.
They booed early in the second quarter when he dialed up a run up the middle on a third and seven that was bottled up for a short gain and they made their displeasure known again when Sorsby dumped it off to Jaylin Lucas behind the line of scrimmage on a third and 13. Lucas was just lucky to make it back to the line of scrimmage.
Carey mostly abandoned what worked on the opening drive, and like the coordinator before him struggled to get IU's offense into a rhythm.
He even tried to go back to the trick play that worked against Michigan with Dovonan McCulley getting the lateral to throw down field, but it was so choreographed that Rutgers immediately sniffed it out.
It was the fourth time this season Indiana's offense has finished with less than 300 total yards.
Michael Niziolek is the Indiana beat reporter for The Bloomington Herald-Times. You can follow him on Twitter @michaelniziolek and read all his coverage by clicking here.
This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Instant Observations from Indiana football's loss to Rutgers
