CHICAGO – Tom Allen’s persistent spring message hasn’t lost speed or relevance in the hottest part of the summer.

Still searching for his first bowl berth in his third year in charge at IU, Allen has strived endlessly for greater depth since he first took charge in Bloomington. In his first season, he had a talented top end of his roster, but precious little to backstop it. In his second, he and his staff assembled a team with talent centered in many positions in its freshman and sophomore classes, and suffered the near misses and late losses one would therefore expect.

Now, in year three — after noticeably improved recruiting and an unbending commitment to his strength staff’s methods — Allen believes he has the numbers and the quality to clear the final hurdle.

“I believe in what we are building at Indiana and how we are building,” Allen said, during remarks delivered to a crowded ballroom at the Hilton Chicago on Thursday at Big Ten media days. “It’s a process to get to where we want (to be) as a program.”

Facing an unkind schedule and still needing to answer some important roster questions (quarterback possibly among them for yet another season), Allen is betting on his team like he never quite has before.

For all of Indiana’s mottos and mantras — from Allen’s omnipresent “love each other” message to “grit,” which he says is his defining word for this season — so much of Indiana’s recent heartbreak has come down to simple math.

The Hoosiers have flattened the competitive curve enough in the last 3-4 years to hold the Big Ten East’s feet to the fire: an overtime loss in 2017 to Michigan at home, or an opener against Ohio State that stayed close for three quarters, or last year’s loss in Ann Arbor, during which Indiana’s players were bizarrely accused of being “too physical” by some Michigan fans.

Of course, the common thread in all those games, and more than a few others in recent years, has been a fourth-quarter fade that undid the good work of the first three.

“Thanks for reminding me of that,” Allen deadpanned when a reporter began a question by mentioning the three games Indiana lost last season by a touchdown or less.

The talent gap to the big four in the East will always be difficult for IU to bridge, but it’s often been the Hoosiers’ noticeable drop in performance or quality as the game marched into its final minutes that eventually let them down.

Allen characterizes the depth he sees on his roster as young experience, but it’s an improvement nonetheless.

On offense, it’s Sampson James, Cole Gest, Ronnie Walker and others giving IU better quality carries when Stevie Scott needs a breath. Scott rushed for over 1,100 yards as a freshman in 2018, but there was a noticeable drop in performance when he went to the sideline.

Allen is leaning hard on three senior offensive linemen to develop a position where Indiana will be breaking in new starters at left guard and right tackle, and will need to replace the depth provided last season by players like Nick Linder and Delroy Baker.

Even his quarterback room, led by returning starter Peyton Ramsey but energized by the recovery of Michael Penix from an ACL tear and the arrival of Utah transfer Jack Tuttle, provides a window into Allen’s fight for a deeper football team.

“We don’t plan to run a two-quarterback system,” Allen said when asked about that specific possibility. “The plan is to pick one, and let him be the man.”

But it’s on defense where Allen needs this transformation to manifest itself most.

The calling card that brought Allen to IU initially, his defensive acumen helped improve a woeful unit from nearly last in the country in 2015 to 27th in total defense just two seasons later. Then came last year’s regression, all the way to 83rd in the country, with Indiana leaning too hard on too many young players.

Now, those young players are older, and Allen sees a world where his youth movement pays off starting this fall.

“Part of it is accepting your role,” he said in a breakout session Thursday. “When you talk about having depth, that means playing more guys. Well, that means some guys playing less. …

“If we’re going to be the best football team, we need to play a lot of guys. And that means you may play less snaps, you may have less tackles than you would if you were playing more snaps. But for the betterment of the team we’ve got to have more guys fresh late in the third quarter, late in the fourth quarter.”

Allen envisions a world where his defense runs out as many as 30 players, across multiple groups. He’s not afraid to lean on the more promising members of his freshman class, the highest-ranked recruiting haul Indiana has ever signed. And he’s confident enough to talk about aiming for a top-25 defense again in 2019.

With the murderer’s row in the East (and in a year where it would probably be more advantageous to have the home-road matchups flipped, with Penn State and Michigan State in Bloomington instead of on the road), his schedule does him few favors.

Win all three nonconference games and beat Rutgers on homecoming, and IU can think about bowl eligibility. Picking two more wins from a group that includes those big four, Northwestern at home, plus trips to Maryland, Nebraska and Purdue, is more difficult.

That’s the calculus Indiana faces every fall, stuck on the wrong side of a lopsided divisional alignment. Allen will hope his own math can finally start to add up in reply.

Follow IndyStar reporter Zach Osterman on Twitter: @ZachOsterman.