The Milan Miracle: The Town That Hoosiers Left Behind By Bill Riley

Abstract

In his 2005 book Transition Game: How Hoosiers Went Hip-Hop, Sports Illustrated writer and Bloomington native L. Jon Wertheim reminded readers—if indeed there were any who needed reminding—“It’s hard to exaggerate just how deeply basketball is embedded in Indiana’s fabric…the filament that threads together towns from Auburn to Zionsville” (p. 2). Bill Riley embedded himself with the 2010-2011 Milan Indians basketball team, heirs to the 1954 championship celebrated in the 1968 film, Hoosiers. The 2010 Indians were not a talented team—most recent Milan teams have not been, he informs readers—and both the regular season and the tournament offered the harsh reality that “Hoosiers never felt so far away” (p. 59). Riley frames this story as a passionate lamentation, one that extends even to the inadequate respect paid to the material remnants of a bygone era.