OK, Hoosier fans and college basketball aficionados:

Here is what I think about the future of IU basketball, short and long term...

Sampson and IU will not be sanctioned by the NCAA. The jury is out for a few more days, but:

1. Mr. Matta at Ohio St. is now clean and ready to go in Columbus. Maybe this is not the perfect precedent to compare, but it bodes well for pre-emptive or self-imposed sanctions like Kelvin and the Oklahoma program enacted before he left Norman.

2. He has dealt with the phone call rule breaking (of his assistant coaches) responsibly and honorably.

3. He can no longer benefit from those rules violations.

4. IU didn't commit the violations, Oklahoma did.

5. Things have to start changing for IU, shut out of the Final Four since '02, and missing the NCAA Tourney twice under Davis since then! Knight missed the NCAA in 1979 and 1985 (and maybe a couple more times in the 70s before the expansion to 64[5] teams). He won the NIT in 1979 and finished second in Madison Square Garden in 1985, against a thin shooter named Reggie (no, not Lewis or that guy for Georgetwon by the same name).

Davis lost to Vanderbilt in the first round in Bloomington, NIT 2005. The year before he finished 14-15, IU's first losing season since a guy named ...Lou Watson? Right, that is not Bobby's thing, unless at TT.

Fast forward

2007: IU should go to the elite 8, and with some luck... ???

2008: A few dynamic frosh will bang with the second year jucos and the senior Hoosier AJ Ratliff to go to the Final Four.

2009: Don't know exactly who or how, but this team will push the envelope...

2010: IU really powers it home after the previous year's flirtation.

Banner # 6 to the rafters.

2011: Could this be a reapeat? Depends on keeping those great recruits from '08 to '10.

2012: Good year.

2013: Building year.

2014: Great year.

2015: Awesome. Banner # 7 to the rafters.

2016: Sampson may be close to quits after two championships, but tying Knight would be so nice...

2017: I can't go that far, we are equally likely to be at war with China... (not to be dark, but this is so much conjecture anyway, might as well consider the worst case scenario...)

And there you have it!

Why the optimism, you ask?

I think IU requires and receives great talent and determination in those who go there. Kelvin Sampson has it, and he will recruit better than in Norman. Shame he lost this last top five class that he built his lifetime to recruit, but:

Now he is poised and recognized as a Jim Calhoun/Lute Olsen type who will earn his just rewards... Throw Boeheim in there, too.

The future is bright, unless something really screwy happens, like ...

1) UNC gets the next 5 great Indiana big men (Montross '93 and May '04)

2) Duke gets even more calls than the last 15 years

3) Everybody and their brother go to Florida, Kansas and Illinois.

4)Ohio St. gets OJ Mayo four years and Oden stays five (redshirting), while Conley hits every shot he ever takes...

IU will win again, we only need to keep the better in-staters starting 2007. And the occasional national superstar.

Hasta entonces: Five banners and counting...