Skip to main content

Fired up: The men and women of IUPUI basketball are ready to tip off the new season

Oct 23, 2019

Are you ready for some IUPUI basketball?

Of course you are. It’s getting too cold to watch sports outside.

Jaylen Minnett, IUPUI Guard
If Jaylen Minnett can scream at a camera, there’s no reason you can’t scream for his team at a game.Photo courtesy of IUPUI Athletics

The season kicks off with the Red-White Scrimmage at 6:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 28, in The Jungle. Both the men’s and women’s teams will be featured in the scrimmage, and they’ll hype you up for the coming season.

Does the men’s team have any games circled on its calendar this year?

“The Butler game, without question,” said forward Elyjah Goss, a junior. “It’s two city D-1 teams, so that game will be packed. It’s like a home game outside of our home gym.”

The crosstown rivals haven’t played each other since December 2015, but there’s no love lost between them.

Other than the Bulldogs, the Jags are looking forward to playing the top-ranked teams in the Horizon League because they believe they can compete with anyone, and that designation just adds more fuel to the fire.

What sort of expectations does the men’s team have coming into the season?

“Definitely 20-plus wins – it’s obtainable if everyone buys in,” Goss said. “We are way more athletic, probably the most athletic team since I’ve come here.”

Goss knows a thing or two about athleticism. He sat out the 2016-17 season as a redshirt, and he isn’t oblivious to the advantages that gave him.

Elyjah Goss, IUPUI Forward
Elyjah Goss flexes all those muscles he’s built over his time at IUPUI.Photo courtesy of IUPUI Athletics

“Mentally, I was ready to play,” he said. “But I realized I wasn’t ready physically, and I still needed to round out parts of my game. I put on 30 pounds of muscle that year thanks to Coach Quarles, our strength coach, and sharpened different skills. When the next season came, I was ready.”

That kind of realistic foresight has paid dividends to Goss’ individual success as well as the team’s overall success. You can check the rest of the Jags’ schedule to plan which games you don’t want to miss – which should be all of them.

Description of the following video:

[Video: A phone appears with the alarm clock ringing at 6:30]

Music plays while an alarm clock rings

[Video: Agatha Beier appears onscreen, talking in her dorm room. She addresses the camera directly before panning the camera to show her lunch and packed bags.]

Agatha speaks: Good morning! We have a very busy day ahead of us today, and I’m going to start out by showing you that I have everything ready for today. I packed my bags last night, set my clothes out – and I even packed my lunch. I just need to put it in my lunchbox, and we’ll be ready to go.

[Video: An aerial shot of the IUPUI campus appears. Text on it reads “A Day in the Life of a Student-Athlete with Agatha Beier”]

Music

[Video: A timelapse shows Agatha making her bed in her dorm room]

Music

[Video: Agatha pans the camera across her kitchen, showing three other female students in the process of breakfast.]

Agatha speaks: Here are my roommates in the morning. Sid’s eating some… What are you eating?

Sid speaks: Yogurt.

Agatha speaks as the camera focuses on her other two roommates; Mo is getting ice from the freezer for her cup: Yogurt. Here’s Mace and Mo. Mace is having a banana; Mo is having some water.

[Video: Agatha pans the camera across her living room to show an assortment of puzzles on the wall, all close together as if they were large piles.

Agatha speaks: Here’s our living room. We pride ourselves on this fine puzzle wall. These are all puzzles that have been glued together.

[Video: Agatha films her teammates walking into practice from a parking lot on the IUPUI campus. The city skyline is in the background, and the sun is rising.]

Agatha speaks: Here’s Holly and some more of my teammates. This is one of my favorite views of the city.

[Video: Agatha shows her teammates walking into the IUPUI Athletic and Fitness Center. She pans the camera over the indoor track and fitness equipment.]

Agatha speaks: Here’s the great NIFS. We come here every day, because we love it. We get real strong and out of breath.

Words appear in the lower-left corner: Now the IUPUI Athletic and Fitness Center

[Video: Two of Agatha’s teammates are walking toward her, one giving a thumbs-up and one making the heart sign with her fingers]

[Video: Agatha films her teammates sitting in a circle stretching and using foam rollers before practice starts.]

Agatha speaks, calling out the actions of individual players: We usually roll out and stretch before we begin our workout. A little butterfly action… I don’t know what that is… Holly’s getting her back… Glutes…

[Video: Agatha addresses the camera directly while on the floor of the athletic center. She’s holding her phone to show the camera the Train Heroic app.]

[Video: Agatha addresses the camera directly while on the floor of the athletic center.]

Agatha speaks: So, this is our Train Heroic app that helps us keep track of our workouts. Type in our reps, type in the weight we use, and it’ll keep it for like the next week, so we know how much to use each time.

Agatha speaks: We worked really hard today. Proud of everyone.

[Video: The team huddles in a circle and puts their hands in the middle. The view is sideways, as Agatha has turned her hand holding the phone to join in the huddle]

The team chants: On the count of three. One, two, three. Jags!

[Video: Agatha shows her feet walking across campus before turning the camera to her face and directly addressing it. She continues to walk across campus as she talks.]

Agatha speaks: My name is Agatha Beier. I’m a junior here at IUPUI. I’m majoring in health services management and also taking pre-recs for med school, so I’ve got a lot on my plate.

I’m also a member of the women’s basketball team here, so that is why I was up at 6:30 getting ready for our weights and conditioning. So this afternoon we will have a class, I’m also a member of a Bible study group here through Impact, and then I’ll be going to the gym for a little shooting session with one of our assistant coaches. I’ll have practice, I’ll take my organic chemistry test, and then I will have my organic chemistry lab after that. So, we’ve got a long day still ahead of us, but I’m glad you’re joining me.

[Video: Agatha films her feet walking across campus. The scene switches to the classroom as she films herself taking notes.]

Music

[Video: Agatha directly addresses the camera while she walks across campus.]

Agatha speaks: So, the review session went well. I am now heading to my academic advisor – my athletic academic advisor. I met with my academic adviser yesterday to get my classes scheduled for next semester, and so now I have to take this form to my athletic adviser just to have him sign off and make sure that I’m fulfilling the requirements for a student-athlete. We have to pass a certain number of hours each semester and then a total number of hours each year, so I’m going to go to the library and see him, and then I’m going to go study a little more before my Bible study.

[Video: Agatha films a timelapse of her walking up the stairs, through the library and to the door of the advising office. She leaves the building and crosses a campus crosswalk.]

Music

[Video: Agatha directly addresses the camera while she walks across campus.]

Agatha speaks; she’s a little out of breath: I just got done shooting with my coach. Now I’m going to go down to our team locker room and get my practice uniform and eat my lunch and do some more studying for organic chemistry. As the day goes on, I get more and more nervous for it, but we’ll see how it goes.

[Video: Agatha films herself walking down the hall and setting down her bags on the floor before opening the door to the locker room.]

Music

[Video: Agatha shows her teammate/roommate sitting on a couch and eating in the breakroom; her laptop is open on the small table in front of her, and there’s a computer tablet on her lap, too.]

Agatha speaks: There’s my roommate! Are you eating your lunch too? It’s lunchtime.

[Video: Agatha heads toward the locker room, stopping by the door to focus the camera on a team poster.]

Agatha speaks: Got some really cool pictures in here. This is our locker room. Here’s my locker. Here’s our whiteboard.

[Video: Agatha enters the locker room, which is covered with images of the team.]

Agatha speaks: This is our locker room. Here’s my locker.

[Video: The camera zooms in on Agatha’s nameplate above her locker. It includes her jersey number, which is 20. Then the camera pans around the entire locker room.]

Agatha speaks: Here’s our whiteboard.

[Video: Agatha addresses the camera directly while sitting on a bench on the inside of the NIFS indoor track.]

Agatha speaks: We are back at NIFS for the third time today, and we are getting ready for practice. It’s two and a half hours, so we are stretching and warming up, getting ready. There’s Sid…

[Video: The camera pans to Sid the roommate and then to the court. The team begins to practice on the court.]

Music plays as various shots of the team practicing come in rapid succession

[Video: Back in her dorm room, Agatha addresses the camera directly.]

Agatha speaks: It’s about 10:30 now, and I’m finally getting ready for bed. I unpacked all my bags from today, and I am ready for some sleep. Thank you guys for following me today. I hope you got a good feel for what it’s like to be a student-athlete here at IUPUI.

The screen goes to a split screen. On the left is a grey vertical rectangle with a red circle inside with a white IU trident and “IUPUI”; beneath the circle is red lettering: SUBSCRIBE. On the right is a silhouette of the Indianapolis skyline on a red background, A clickable screenshot from another IUPUI video is in the center.

A video documenting the life of a student athlete.

Author

More stories

News at IU  
News at IU