Here are the candidates for SBLive’s Indiana High School Athlete of the Week as nominated by fans, readers and SBLive’s staff. 

Read through the nominees and cast your vote at the bottom of the page. Voting will conclude on Sunday at 11:59 p.m. and the winner will be announced the following week. If you would like to nominate an athlete in the future, please email .

THIS WEEK’S SBLIVE INDIANA ATHLETE OF THE WEEK NOMINEES:

Editor’s Note: Our Athlete of the Week feature and corresponding poll are intended to be fun, and we do not set limits on how many times a fan can vote during the competition. However, we do not allow votes that are generated by script, macro or other automated means. Athletes who receive votes generated by script, macro or other automated means will be disqualified.

The Louisville recruit had eight tackles (six solo) and three sacks in a 30-0 shutout of Indianapolis North Central.

Byrd threw for 308 yards and five TDs, and also ran for a score, in a 54-7 win against Salem.

The Indiana commit had five receptions for 202 yards and a TD in a 45-21 victory over Wayne (Ohio).

The junior had 317 yards and four touchdowns on 30 touches in a 48-26 win against Beech Grove.

The senior threw for 301 yards and had the game-winning TD pass in the final minute of a 16-13 win over Indianapolis Lutheran.

The junior threw for 271 yards and four touchdowns in a 41-21 victory against Shenandoah.

The Miami (Ohio) commit passed for four touchdowns and ran for another in a 46-13 win against Merrillville.

The Stanford recruit had 11 catches for 97 yards and a TD in a 17-14 overtime victory vs. Noblesville.

The senior ran 15 times for 250 yards and two scores in a 56-28 victory over West Lafayette Harrison.

The junior had a 64-yard touchdown catch and a 66-yard interception return for a TD in a 43-29 win against Whiteland. He had 150 yards on four receptions.

Higgins had three goals and an assist in wins against Evansville North and Floyd Central.

The Kansas commit and two-way starting lineman had 2.5 tackles for loss and 1.5 sacks in a 20-0 shutout of Chesterton.

The junior had 305 total yards and five touchdowns in a 50-31 loss to Martinsville.

Hughes shot the best score in program history, a 73, to earn medalist honors at the Pocket Athletic Conference Tournament.

The sophomore passed for 178 yards, ran for 130 and had four TDs in a 49-14 win against Wawasee.

The senior had 225 yards and two TDs in a 42-21 win against New Castle.

The junior had 325 yards and three scores on 44 carries in a 53-34 win against Heritage Christian.

The sophomore had a program-record 238 yards and two touchdowns on 11 catches in a 24-10 win over Kentucky power Louisville Trinity.

Nolan ran 15:02 to win the Rick Weinheimer Invitational at Columbus North.

The senior had 206 total yards and two TDs on 23 touches in a 38-14 win against Pike.

The junior had 10 rushes for 177 yards and a pair of touchdowns in a 41-13 win against Yorktown.

The sophomore had 230 yards and two TDs on seven receptions in a 40-0 shutout of Franklin Central.

The sophomore had 266 total yards and threw for five touchdowns in a 69-8 win against Frankfort.

The junior contributed three sacks and two tackles for loss in a 35-7 win against South Bend Riley.

Williams shot a 73 to earn medalist honors and lead the Barons to the team title at the Fort Wayne Carroll Invitational.

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– Mike Clark

Indiana football opened its 2024 season with two dominant victories over Florida International and Western Illinois.

But the Hoosiers’ biggest stain in both games was similar. They allowed their opponents to drive downfield and record their only score of the game in the final minutes of the first half.

After two straight weeks allowing subpar non-conference opponents to march downfield and score at the end of the second quarter, two-minute drill defense is one of IU football’s bigger issues early this season.

“That was pretty bad, I’ll be completely honest. That was pretty bad. Cause the same thing happened last week,” defensive end Mikail Kamara said after the Western Illinois game. “So we’ve got to end the halves a lot better. That’s something we’re definitely going to be focusing on, especially that middle eight. So that’s something we’ve got to do better going forward.”

The drives near the end of the second quarter against FIU and Western Illinois both lasted 13 plays, including the Leathernecks’ field goal. But the Panthers drive took over four minutes of game time, while WIU’s lasted around two.

The film reveals that IU utilized different approaches to these two series, but got burned both times.

When FIU got the ball back with 4:53 left in the half after an IU touchdown, defensive coordinator Bryant Haines remained aggressive. He continued to bring blitzes and pressures to stymie shifty Panthers quarterback Keyone Jenkins. And those pressures backfired on several occasions.

The Panthers called plays — some were audibles from Jenkins — that negated IU’s rush in different ways. Most of these were quick hitters, like a slant or toss, that opened up looks without requiring time for the play to develop. That strategy produced mostly short gains — FIU’s biggest play of the scoring drive was an 11-yard completion. Key missed tackles by defensive tackle CJ West and defensive end Venson Sneed Jr. made things worse, and the Panthers capitalized with their only score of the game.

“The end of the second quarter didn’t go the way we were expecting,” linebacker Aiden Fisher said after the FIU game. “We did a lot of sloppy things, a lot of messy things, missing tackles, bad angles, just really not what our defense is about.”

Haines called the late-half drive against Western Illinois more conservatively.

Indiana spent most of the Leathernecks’ scoring drive sitting in zone coverage, mostly in the base defense without heavy pass rush. IU’s safeties sat deep in pass coverage, leaving plenty of space for WIU receivers. Jamier Johnson and D’Angelo Ponds both got beat during the drive, and Jailin Walker also missed a tackle early in the series that led to the first WIU first down of the game.

Western Illinois exploited the spacious coverage for some bigger gains than FIU got on its drive. The biggest play of the drive, a 30-yard pass that put WIU in the red zone, happened because the Leathernecks found a soft spot in the zone coverage and took advantage.

Even head coach Curt Cignetti may have made a mistake during this series: he declined an illegal formation penalty on the Leathernecks that would’ve given them second and 11 from their own 44 as opposed to third and six from the 49. The individual decision didn’t matter as much in a blowout game, but the longer yardage would’ve made it tougher for WIU to extend its drive.

The Hoosiers were too easy to pick apart on that drive, both because of scheme and individual mistakes.

Cignetti didn’t want to discuss much detail on the Western Illinois series after the game before he could watch the tape.

“There were probably a couple mistakes in there. I think we had subbed a little bit at certain positions also,” Cignetti said. “You’ve got to finish the half well. You’ve got to start the third quarter well. We’ve been starting the third quarter well, but we haven’t finished the half well. We’ve been starting the game well and finishing the game well too. There’s a lot more positives, but just like 98 percent of the teams in the country, we have a couple things to work on and improve on.”

These scoring drives didn’t impact either game that much, as the Hoosiers had full control of both contests. But if IU’s late-half problems resurface against better opponents, it could spell trouble.

For complete coverage of IU football, GO HERE. 

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BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – Derek Owings, Indiana’s strength and conditioning coach for football, was once big into golf. The one-time tight end at Mercer was allegedly a long hitter off the tee, too.

“I can still hit it, you know, I just don’t get out there as much as I used to,” Owings told host Don Fischer during the Inside Indiana Football radio show Wednesday.

That’s because Owings is extremely devoted to his job. When he’s not working with Indiana’s football players to improve their bodies and health, he’s reading about what he can do to improve his own craft in the strength and conditioning business.

“I kind of just junky in my profession. Man, I’m always trying to learn, read, educate myself. I always feel like if I’m not improving, somebody’s outworking me. And I think everything that I learn, I can pour back into our student athletes. And that’s ultimately why I feel like I’m on this planet,” Owings said.

Owings relayed to Fischer that he’s always wanted to go into coaching. His passion for strength and conditioning was triggered when he was a player.

“When I was in high school, I thought I wanted to be a football coach. (Then) I fell in love with the process, the training,” Owings said. “I kind of flip from wanting to be a football coach to a strength coach, you know, train kids, develop them, understand how important health is during their career, but also life after football, teaching them what to eat, when to eat, why to eat, those things, proper training. And, you know, something I fell in love with, and I knew that’s what I wanted to do.”

Owings has the kind of personality needed to devote himself to his profession. He’s all in, all of the time.

“I was an average athlete, maybe above average, but everything I did … I worked as hard as I could, you know, I was that kid that would, you know, bring my food scale into the cafeteria and I was measuring out foods like I knew what I wanted to do and kind of how to get there,” Owings said.

“I don’t want to say I was born to do this, but I got a kind of certain level of OCD and how I want things done, and how we’re going to run things,” Owings added.

Owings said his priorities in training are to train through a full range of motion, prioritize speed, joint integrity, joint health and nutrition. Owings said his mission is to build a foundation and it’s important that athletes work at a consistent tempo and with similar techniques.

“Unless there’s an orthopedic issue, nobody’s lift should look different. A squat should look the same. And we’re going to hold those kids to that every single day,” Owings said.

Owings is part of Indiana’s new staff of coaches under first-year head coach Curt Cignetti. He’s also one of seven coaches who worked under Cignetti at James Madison.

Obviously, Owings has Cignetti’s trust and was brought to Bloomington to help foster the culture that Cignetti wants to build. Few coaches work so directly with the athletes than the strength coach does, so Owings has had a crucial role in the transition.

What Owings likes about working with Cignetti is that once trust is established, Cignetti usually lets his assistant coaches carry on with their jobs.

“I think that’s my favorite part about (Cignetti). ‘Hey, this is what I want. These are my expectations. Now, go train them how you need to.’ And he does the same thing with the rest of the staff, too. He gives us a lot of ownership inside our department,” Owings said.

Like so many of the coaches who came with Cignetti, Owings projects confidence in what their system entails. Because of that, much of the onus for player improvement is put on to the shoulders of the player himself. Accountability is a big deal in the Indiana program, and that includes the weight room. Owings has a staff of four assistants who help keep everyone in line.

“Coach and myself are going to write a plan that’s going to be as good as anybody in the country can. We’re going to maximize your development,” Owings said.

“But when you’re outside of this building, what are your eating habits? What are your sleeping habits, what are your partying habits? What are you putting inside your body? And those are the kids that really want to buy in and be as good as they can be,” Owings added.