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Ohio State Finishing Fast After Mid-Season Struggles

Buckeyes roll into home finale as best in Big Ten over last 10 games
Bruce Hooley|
Ohio State Finishing Fast After Mid-Season Struggles
Ohio State Finishing Fast After Mid-Season Struggles

Ohio State's players could have said the exact same thing they're saying now a little more than a month ago and received a much different response than the knowing nods such talk currently elicits.

Back then, no one would have doubted the Buckeyes when they claimed, "We're built for this."

Not if the, "this," to which they were referring was, an epic collapse.

A 77-63 win over Michigan on Sunday lent further veracity to the assertion that OSU, indeed, possesses the requisite capabilities to construct something enviable from the ruins of a 11-1 start that morphed into a 2-6 beginning to Big Ten play.

Since the last week of January, the Buckeyes have gone 8-2 in the conference, however, to match league-leading Maryland for the best record of anyone in the league over that span and thus have assured themselves no worse than the .500 finish that once looked improbable.

“I’m not trying to sound cocky or anything, but I think our team is kinda built for the moment,” said junior point guard C.J. Walker. “We’re built for this. Our coaches believe in all of us. We feel like we can play at any level with any team.”

Well, sure, now there's a legion of believers, but the boat that held those who expected this was more kayak than cruise ship when the Buckeyes lost by 14 at Penn State -- a team they beat by 32 at home -- and on a buzzer-beater to visiting Minnesota amid a nightmarish stretch of six losses in seven games.

The extreme makeover started with a win at lowly Northwestern, which is not exactly a season-changing momentum gainer, and whatever mojo came with that vanished days later when freshman D.J. Carton left the team to tend to his mental health.

Carton isn't back yet, and it's looking less likely by the day that he'll return this season.

The loss of his electric abilities would be enough to overcome, but OSU has also suffered from the absence of starting forward Kyle Young the past 2 1/2 games and freshman forward Alonzo Gaffney the past two.

Head coach Chris Holtmann is down to eight scholarship players and only three guards, so he's riding essentially a 6 1/2-man rotation and riding all three guards and brothers Andre and Kaleb Wesson.

Ohio State's recovery would make more sense if the 6-9, 250-pound Wesson had loaded his teammates onto his broad shoulders and carried them to their recent success, but that's just not the case.

While he is a nice player whose abilities inside and outside must be respected, thus opening avenues for others, he remains wildly inconsistent.

He was thoroughly outplayed and intimidated by Iowa's Luka Garza, then followed that by ending a streak of nine straight double-doubles by Maryland's outstanding sophomore Jalen Smith, dominating him so severely Terps coach Mark Turgeon whined incessantly about Wesson being a bully.

If that ever figured to be true, it was Sunday against Michigan, which Wesson owned with perhaps his best game as a collegian -- 23 points, 12 rebounds, three assists, two steals -- the first time around.

But instead, he shot 1-for-9 from two-point range and looked like he wanted no part of any physical battle with Michigan's Jon Teske, who suffered a 1-for-7 shooting night the first time the teams played in Ann Arbor.

That didn't come back to haunt the Buckeyes because Wesson hit four three-pointers and because each of his fellow starters scored in double figures, with Walker's 15 points, seven assists, six rebounds and only one turnover representing his best game this season.

Against Maryland, Luther Muhammad had a season-high 22.

Washington has had 13 or more in each of the last four games.

Whenever OSU has needed something, someone has stepped forward with it entering its 7 p.m. regular-season home finale Thursday against Illinois (20-9, 12-6).

"I think we just have to play hard," Washington said. "We have to play harder than the other team. The 50-50 balls have to be ours...I think it’s a rhythm, it’s us trusting each other, believing in each other and having the utmost confidence in each other that we’re gonna make the big shots, make the right plays and know where we’re gonna be at certain times.”

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Bruce Hooley
BRUCE HOOLEY

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