Madison - These are trying and turbulent times for the Indiana football program.

Consider:

* On Oct. 24, the Hoosiers blew a 28-3 lead en route to a 29-28 Big Ten Conference loss at Northwestern. That dropped the Hoosiers' record to 1-3 in the Big Ten and 4-4 overall.

* Four days later, head coach Bill Lynch received a vote of confidence from Indiana athletic director Fred Glass. Glass insisted he plans to honor the final two years of Lynch's contract, which runs through the 2011 season.

"I think contracts need to mean something at Indiana again," Glass told reporters. "But beyond the pure letter of what we agreed on, I think coach Lynch has done a good job and will continue to be successful at Indiana beyond the length of his current contract.

"Sports Illustrated picked us to win two games . . . Last year we got shellacked by Purdue in one of the worst Bucket games ever. This year, you can see the improvement."

* Then on Saturday, the Hoosiers blew leads of 21-7 and 24-14 before falling at Iowa, 42-24.

As the Hoosiers (1-4, 4-5) prepare to host the University of Wisconsin (6-2, 3-2) at 11 a.m. Saturday, they must discover how to cope with the back-to-back crushing losses and learn how to hold onto leads.

"We got into the fourth quarter again and we couldn't fight it off," Lynch said after the loss to Iowa. "We just didn't have enough plays in our arsenal to hang with them."

That sentiment could summarize the Hoosiers' overall plight.

Lynch inherited the program from Terry Hoeppner, who died from complications from brain cancer before the 2007 season. The Hoosiers finished 7-6 that season - a record that included a 33-3 loss to UW - and secured a bowl berth for the first time since the 1993 season. A 49-33 loss to Oklahoma State in the Insight Bowl marred what had been a memorable run.

Rather than building on that 7-6 finish, the Hoosiers fell to 3-9 last season and were a bad team across the board. Two of the three victories came against Football Championship Subdivision teams (Western Kentucky and Murray State) and the Hoosiers allowed 40 or more points six times, including a 55-20 home loss to UW.

The Hoosiers won their first three games this season- against Eastern Kentucky, Western Michigan and Akron - but have lost five of their last six.

That run started with a bitter 36-33 loss at Michigan and included an embarrassing 44-7 loss at Virginia. Virginia (3-5, 2-2 Atlantic Coast Conference) has losses to William & Mary and Southern Mississippi on its resume.

"It's been an up and down year," Glass told reporters. "I think early in the year they improved game to game. The Virginia game was not good, and the question became whether that was indicative of where the program was going. We found out against Illinois that it wasn't, because the team had its best performance of the year."

Yes, the Hoosiers did end a three-game losing streak with a 24-14 victory over Illinois. But the Illini (2-6, 1-5) hadn't beaten a Bowl Championship Subdivision team until they crushed lowly Michigan on Saturday.

The ugly loss to Northwestern followed.

"The Northwestern game was on of those crazy games that we have all been a part of where there are so many plays," Lynch said. "We played hard."

No one has questioned the effort of the Indiana players, just the results.

Lynch, 14-20 as Indiana's coach, believes that Glass' vote of confidence is only one of the factors that will aid the program over the next few seasons.

"I am excited, because I think we got a great future here," he said after a recent practice. "I've really enjoyed working with Fred and his staff over these last so many months. I really do appreciate the support. We got some really good things going and (are) looking forward to the future."

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