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(10) tOSU vs. (2) Arizona, Sat 3/21 @ 5:15p ET, CBS

Arizona is one of the most talented teams in the tournament, and one of the more legitimate title contenders in the field. They're big, athletic, and defend freakishly well. Ohio State may get blown out because Arizona is the kind of team Ohio State doesn't matchup with, but I expect Matta and his staff to throw something at Arizona that assures we at least have a shot to win at the end. A victory would be hard to come by, but if it were to happen Russell and Scott would have to play as well, if not better than they did today. Williams and McDonald were surprisingly efficient today. Ohio State could certainly use that so 6'4 Tate isn't left defending a 7' center. Points from an unexpected place (like Bates-Diop) are also tremendously important.

All that said, I like our chances on Saturday. I don't think we'll win, but I'm excited see what happens. I picked Arizona to win it all in my bracket, and I'm sure a lot of others did as well. At least one perennial favorite goes down on the first weekend, so why not Arizona?
 
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DAR needs 30, Scott needs to penetrate and dish without spending the first 10 minutes throwing up threes, Amir needs to defend the paint and Bates-Diop needs to be the other threat from deep. Even if that all happens the Buckeyes could lose. If those things don't happen it could get ugly.
 
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DAR needs 30, Scott needs to penetrate and dish without spending the first 10 minutes throwing up threes, Amir needs to defend the paint and Bates-Diop needs to be the other threat from deep. Even if that all happens the Buckeyes could lose. If those things don't happen it could get ugly.
Probably even a little bit more than the above will need to happen or this game will not just get ugly but get Wisconsin ugly. We cannot turn the ball over, we have to make our free throws and somehow out rebound them. Matta can coach but so can his protégé which is even going to make it more difficult.
 
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Only good thing is their big forwards are more perimeter oriented and Tarczewski is still raw on offense and doesn't have much post up game. Still a huge mismatch because Tate is going to be guarding someone at least 3 inches taller than him. Hopefully KBD gets more minutes than Loving in this game. Loving has obv been lacking but his defense was terrible the other day and KBD had shown spurts on defense when he played earlier.

This AZ team is scary good though. Johnson and Holli-Jefferson are for sure 1st round picks. Tarczewski prolly going near the end of the first and Ashley on 2nd round and a senior PG that plays within himself. AZ also outweighs our starting 5 by around 250 lbs and has 8 inches on us but we have this kid called Russell so anything is possible!
 
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I think there is a lot of generalizations out there about Arizona. Yes, they are very good, and should beat OSU. But it's not like they have an NBA frontcourt and are without weaknesses.

Arizona had 3 losses to non-NCAA tournament teams this season, UNLV, Arizona St and Oregon St (OSU had one such L). Also struggled twice to beat UCLA who barely made the tournament as one of the last at-large teams selected, one of those games was at home. Did not have a true road game at UCLA. Had a home comeback W versus Gonzaga in nonconference play, other than that they had a neutral court W vs SDSU by 2 points and that was all they had in the way of good nonconference wins. There are reasons this team was a #2 seed instead of a #1. Their big men are big and physical but they do not have anywhere near the post skill of a Kaminsky, they are very much jumpshot-oriented bigs. Amir actually had one of his better games against those guys. McConnell is a good PG but his production has been limited somewhat. Johnson is a talented freshman but he has been one of those guys who keeps trying to prove he can hit outside shots, and even when he isn't making them he will not stop shooting them, and he has been pulled from games due to lax defense. Johnson is actually a much better option to guard a guy like Russell compared to Hollis-Jefferson (who is basically their do-it-all forward), because he is quicker and has faster hands to get steals on guards. They have a couple guards coming in off the bench who are good shooters (York and Pitts) but they are not very good at basketball aside from being able to shoot - shaky on D and York in particular makes some dumb turnovers. They have had only 2 players make more than 25 3s this season, Johnson (38%) and York (38%), who have made 41 and 56 respectively.

So this is a team that you think OSU might be able to zone but the zone that Oregon ran was very ineffective and Zona is actually a team that likes to have their bigs get room to shoot those long 2s as that is their strength offensively so while theoretically the zone you would think would be effective since they are not a great perimeter shooting team, it might not be as good in practice as it seems in theory. While the thought is that OSU lacks the size to match up with Arizona, most of the teams in the Pac-12 were even worse off in terms of size and shotblocking ability compared to OSU.

So yes I expect Arizona to win, but I would not be shocked to see OSU win this game. They could beat OSU easily but I just am not expecting that, I foresee a close game.
 
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Those games were also months ago. Arizona is on another planet offensively than they were in late December. Won 18/19 including 12 straight by an average of 22+ points. Arizona is a terrible matchup for tosu with our huge size and athleticism advantage. All we gotta do is focus on Russell(who is really good) and then plan our game and we should win by 15+. In your analysis, it reeks of not ever watching Arizona or Pac 12 basketball. Focusing on those 3 month old losses and using them as the crutch of your analysis is like saying in January tosu would get demolished by Oregon because of your home loss to Virginia tech.

Crazier things have happened though so we'll see what happens tomorrow.
 
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Those games were also months ago. Arizona is on another planet offensively than they were in late December. Won 18/19 including 12 straight by an average of 22+ points. Arizona is a terrible matchup for tosu with our huge size and athleticism advantage. All we gotta do is focus on Russell(who is really good) and then plan our game and we should win by 15+. In your analysis, it reeks of not ever watching Arizona or Pac 12 basketball. Focusing on those 3 month old losses and using them as the crutch of your analysis is like saying in January tosu would get demolished by Oregon because of your home loss to Virginia tech.

Crazier things have happened though so we'll see what happens tomorrow.
Size yes, athleticism no.
 
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DAR needs 30, Scott needs to penetrate and dish without spending the first 10 minutes throwing up threes, Amir needs to defend the paint and Bates-Diop needs to be the other threat from deep. Even if that all happens the Buckeyes could lose. If those things don't happen it could get ugly.

DAR needs 50
Scott needs at least 15 assists plus 10 points of his own
Loving needs to get out of his funk
Amir/Trey need to provide something other than frustration
KBD/Tate/Kam all need to provide in their spots and rebound well.

I don't see how Ohio State conceivably wins this without either a spectacular one of a kind performance from DAR OR Arizona playing like Providence did tonight against Dayton. Seeing as their coach is very familiar with matta, their team has superior cohesiveness if not talent and that Ohio State is extremely inconsistent, I'd say a 10+ point loss in the offing....
 
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I needed to come over here (I have been distracted with wrestling and this whole 12 hour a day work thing)...mostly to say I am really proud of this team's effort this season. I have said it all year long that we have a talent deficiency, not an effort deficiency and I would take that any day to the converse. That was a really fun win over VCU and to be frank, there were many times I did not know if we would even make the tourney, let alone hit the field of 32. No matter what happens tomorrow, these guys should hang their heads high.
 
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Those games were also months ago. Arizona is on another planet offensively than they were in late December. Won 18/19 including 12 straight by an average of 22+ points. Arizona is a terrible matchup for tosu with our huge size and athleticism advantage. All we gotta do is focus on Russell(who is really good) and then plan our game and we should win by 15+. In your analysis, it reeks of not ever watching Arizona or Pac 12 basketball. Focusing on those 3 month old losses and using them as the crutch of your analysis is like saying in January tosu would get demolished by Oregon because of your home loss to Virginia tech.

Crazier things have happened though so we'll see what happens tomorrow.
So they have a win streak, with a narrow win over Utah being the crown jewel. Congrats! Arizona does not really have an athleticism advantage in the game, the size advantage I think is overblown. OSU is every bit as good as Utah in my opinion. OSU's problem is a lack of consistent scoring, if they can hold down Arizona on offense - which is UA's weaker side - it will be close.
 
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