Indiana high school basketball to be told with America 250 project

When you think of Indiana, you think of a few things.

Corn fields. The Indy 500. Peyton Manning and Reggie Miller.

Near the top of the list for most? High school basketball.

It’s what we do best in The Hoosier State. Is it what it used to be back in the “good ol’ days?” No. But how many states still put 10,000-plus people consistently into an NBA arena every year for its state finals? None. Except Indiana.

That’s what made writing about this subject easy when asked to write about something related to America’s 250th birthday. There’s a yearlong “America 250” celebration going on, and this will be our contribution to it.

Now, I’m sure you’re wondering who “we” and “our” are. That would be the high school sports journalists across five Indiana newspapers within USA Today Company: South Bend Tribune, Journal & Courier (Lafayette), The Star Press (Muncie), The Herald-Times (Bloomington) and Courier & Press (Evansville). We have been working on this project for a few months now, and we are excited to show you what we’ve produced.

When we set out to do this project, we had two mission statements guiding us: how do we tell this story without it being the “same old story”; and why did high school basketball become “the” sport in Indiana? I hope we answer both of those questions in this series.

Our team — Kyle Smedley and Scott Davidson in South Bend, Ethan Hanson in Lafayette, Cade Hampton in Muncie, Jim Gordillo in Bloomington, and Kyle Sokeland and Markos Tsegaye in Evansville — poured in hours of research, interviews and work into this. While we cover the stories you all love and know, we also provide some insights into things you maybe didn’t know about (like French Lick’s sports history beyond Larry Bird).

Running online and in weekday newspapers from July 7-17, we will explore the history of Indiana high school basketball. From the early days to what the future looks like, we have you covered.

We hope you enjoy reading these stories as much as we did putting them together.

Austin Hough is a sports editor within the Center for Community Journalism at USA Today Co., overseeing high school sports and Notre Dame athletics coverage for five Indiana newspapers. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) @AustinRHough. Hough can be emailed at ahough@usatodayco.com.