When you think of sports at the University of Indiana, what comes to mind? Maybe it’s the prospect for the men’s basketball team to repeat its run to the national championship. Or, possibly, how the team will fill sophomore sensation Jared Jeffries’ shoes.

Football probably comes second shelf to the basketball team at the University of Indiana, and the only name most people associate with Indiana football is that of departed quarterback, now NFL receiver, Antuan Randle El.

However, it would come as a surprise to many to find that the Indiana football team has the best one-two receiver combo in the Big Ten.

Combining for 8.2 catches and 168.4 yards per game, junior wide receiver Glenn Johnson and sophomore wide receiver Courtney Roby have become the surprise one-two wideout punch in the league.

Ranked the number-eight receiver in the Big Ten, Johnson has in particular become an explosive offensive weapon for Indiana.

Johnson grew up in Clewiston, Fla., a place he describes as “a small town on lake Okeechobee,” where “people grew up playing football and fishing.” Although not a fisherman himself, Johnson grew up enjoying a variety of sports in high school, including baseball, basketball, track and his all-time favorite hobby, billiards.

At the age of 13, Johnson moved in with his older sister Dena.

“She’s the person that motivates and encourages me to be successful,” Johnson said. “I look up to her — she’s my sibling role model.”

Johnson needed this support most in 1997, when four or five games into his high school football season he fractured his collarbone.

“That was tough,” Johnson said. “I was just starting to make my transition from quarterback to wide receiver.”

Johnson missed the remaining 14 weeks of the season and had to watch on the sidelines as his team went all the way to the state finals without him. Sitting out was an experience he used to motivate him in the years that followed.

Johnson returned the next season and bounced back well enough to impress the Indiana scouts. When Johnson arrived in Indiana, he planned to play both basketball and football, but early on decided to stick with just football. However, this doesn’t mean he doesn’t keep track of what is going on with the basketball program.

“We have some top recruits coming in; we have a pretty good chance at repeating for a chance at the national title,” Johnson said.

Johnson took a red-shirt year before showing promise as a sophomore, when he caught 21 passes for 229 yards and a touchdown.

However, the real explosion has come in this, his junior year, now that the option offense of Antuan Randle El is long gone and the newly implanted West Coast offense of first-year coach Gerry DiNardo has started to yield yards for the wide receivers.

“I like to catch balls, I agree with [the offense],” Johnson said. “This type of offense gives me the ability to go out and make plays.”

Not only has Johnson had a breakout year, but sophomore wide receiver Courtney Roby is also coming into his own. Averaging 87.2 yards per game, Roby has made people stop and look at the Indiana passing game.

It seems that Johnson has found a good chemistry with the younger Roby.

“We feed off each other,” Johnson said. “If one of us is doing pretty good in a game, the other is getting mentally motivated to top the other.”

Not that there is any animosity on or off the field between the two. They both simply want to be the best.

“It is all positive competition — nothing negative,” Johnson said. “We want to be the best one-two receivers out there; that’s what we are striving to do.”

As for the future, Johnson has one goal set in mind — the NFL.

He also wouldn’t mind getting a little closer to home, if it means playing for the Miami Dolphins, the team that played just an hour away from his house, even though it means he wouldn’t get a chance to catch passes from his favorite quarterback, Michael Vick. Favorite, that is, aside from IU quarterback Gibran Hamdan.

Johnson does understand that this may not be an easy task, but he’s ready for the long haul.

“I’m going to do whatever it takes, even if that means some years at arena football,” Johnson said. “That’s what I’m striving to do, and whatever happens from there, we’ll see.”