• Follow us on Twitter @buckeyeplanet and @bp_recruiting, like us on Facebook! Enjoy a post or article, recommend it to others! BP is only as strong as its community, and we only promote by word of mouth, so share away!
  • Consider registering! Fewer and higher quality ads, no emails you don't want, access to all the forums, download game torrents, private messages, polls, Sportsbook, etc. Even if you just want to lurk, there are a lot of good reasons to register!

No. 1 Ohio State vs. #9 Xavier (Game Thread)

Jump to latest Follow Reply
Sort by date Sort by votes
CPD

Ball was in the right hands



Sunday, March 18, 2007 Bill Livingston

Plain Dealer Columnist
Lexington, Ky. - The Thad Five was seconds from becoming the Thud Five. Ohio State's biggest name and biggest player, Greg Oden, had fouled out for the first time in his freshman year on what could have been called an intentional foul. The rest of the freshmen who arrived in Columbus to trumpet fanfares were playing as if dwarfed by the moment.
Ron Lewis, the Buckeyes' senior starter in the backcourt, told freshman playmaker Mike Conley Jr. the same thing he had told him when Lewis' 3-pointer beat Tennessee in the final seconds. "Give me the ball," Lewis said.
The Buckeyes, trailing by two points, broke their huddle with 9.3 seconds left and Xavier's Justin Cage at the foul line for a one-and-one. Cage was so hot, you would have asked him which numbers he liked in the Powerball lottery. But the numbers came up 1-for-2 when 2-for-2 would have sent OSU home as losers.

Cont'd...
 
Upvote 0
Canton

Lewis sinks a sweet shot
Sunday, March 18, 2007
By FRED GOODALL
AP Sports Writer

LEXINGTON, Ky. Hold the questions about Greg Oden?s future. Ohio State isn?t finished in the NCAA tournament.

Ron Lewis revived the Buckeyes? national championship hopes with a long 3-pointer with two seconds left to force overtime, then Mike Conley Jr. dominated the extra period for a 78-71 victory over Xavier in a second-round South Regional game Saturday.

The Buckeyes? rally from an 11-point deficit in regulation ensured the Oden era will last at least one more game.

Cont'd...
 
Upvote 0
Cincy

The 1 that got away
Top-seeded Ohio St. breaks Xavier's heart with late rally, stunning 3-pointer, 78-71 OT win
BY DUSTIN DOW | [email protected]
http://del.icio.us/post
1x1.gif

LEXINGTON - How long was it? Two seconds? Three? Xavier freshman Derrick Brown was standing below the basket. It seemed like an eternity. And he knew it was going to end badly.
Brown watched helplessly as Ron Lewis' 3-pointer from 24 feet swished through the basket with two seconds left in regulation.

Cont'd...
 
Upvote 0
Cincy

XU seniors left their mark
Miller: 'The hardest part ... is it ends their career'
BY DUSTIN DOW | [email protected]
http://del.icio.us/post
1x1.gif

LEXINGTON - They won 89 games, played in three NCAA Tournaments and won two conference tournaments and one Atlantic 10 Conference regular-season title.
Xavier's seniors, Justin Cage, Justin Doellman and Brandon Cole, played their final game Saturday in a 78-71 overtime loss to Ohio State at Rupp Arena. But they ended their careers in a flourish.
Cage scored a career-high 25 points; Cole successfully defended Ohio State's All-America center, Greg Oden; and Doellman (13 points) gave Xavier the offensive lift early the in second half that put Xavier in position to nearly upset the No. 1 seed Buckeyes in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.

Contd....
 
Upvote 0
Cincy

OSU's Matta says Miller deserves a raise from XU; Michigan, Minnesota have openings
BY DUSTIN DOW | [email protected]
http://del.icio.us/post
1x1.gif

LEXINGTON - Ohio State coach Thad Matta spent a lot of time in the days before Saturday's Xavier-Ohio State game talking about what good friends he and Xavier coach Sean Miller are.
After Ohio State's 78-71 overtime win at Rupp Arena, Matta went a step further and called for Miller to receive a raise.
"The thing with Xavier, it is a great program," Matta said. "Make no mistake about it, he's going to have options just like I did. I think the big thing for them is to put him in a position to coach, because Xavier is a big-time program. But he sits in the middle of the pack in the Atlantic 10 (in terms of compensation). His expectations are you better win every damn game to get to the Final Four. So, hopefully, when they get back, they're going to take great care of him."

Cont'd...
 
Upvote 0
Morning Journal

Lewis' 3 sends OSU into OT for 78-71 win
JASON LLOYD, Morning Journal Writer
03/18/2007

Email to a friendPost a CommentPrinter-friendly

LEXINGTON, Ky. -- Ron Lewis will receive his sociology degree during Ohio State's graduation today. Perfect timing. Yesterday he passed the biggest test of his life.


Lewis' 3-pointer from 23 feet with 2 seconds left capped a wild Ohio State comeback, sending the game to overtime, where the Buckeyes survived a second-round scare from Xavier, 78-71. It sends the No. 1 seed Buckeyes to San Antonio, Texas next weekend, where Thursday they'll face the winner of today's second-round game between fourth-seeded Virginia and fifth-seeded Tennessee.

Cont'd...
 
Upvote 0
osugrad21;786187; said:
Cincy

OSU's Matta says Miller deserves a raise from XU; Michigan, Minnesota have openings
BY DUSTIN DOW | [email protected]
http://del.icio.us/post
1x1.gif

LEXINGTON - Ohio State coach Thad Matta spent a lot of time in the days before Saturday's Xavier-Ohio State game talking about what good friends he and Xavier coach Sean Miller are.
After Ohio State's 78-71 overtime win at Rupp Arena, Matta went a step further and called for Miller to receive a raise.
"The thing with Xavier, it is a great program," Matta said. "Make no mistake about it, he's going to have options just like I did. I think the big thing for them is to put him in a position to coach, because Xavier is a big-time program. But he sits in the middle of the pack in the Atlantic 10 (in terms of compensation). His expectations are you better win every damn game to get to the Final Four. So, hopefully, when they get back, they're going to take great care of him."

Cont'd...
Click to expand...

Thad's probably got Tressel calling Vloyd to talk up his buddy. They really seem to like each other even on the court.
 
Upvote 0
Chicago Trib

OHIO STATE 78, XAVIER 71 (OT)
Lewis rescues Ohio State


By Emily Badger
Sentinel Staff Writer
Published March 17, 2007, 6:09 PM CDT

LEXINGTON, Ky. -- The winning coach didn't look all that happy and neither did the fan-favorite face of the winning team after top-seeded Ohio State survived a come-from-behind victory in overtime against No. 9 Xavier Saturday in the South Region.

Ohio State center Greg Oden sat in the Buckeye locker room glowering over how he'd let his team down. He fouled out with nine seconds to play in regulation and missed all of the overtime frame as guard Mike Conley scored 11 of his 21 points to carry the Buckeyes to the 78-71 win.


And then there was Thad Matta, the former Xavier and current Ohio State head coach, who will advance now to the Sweet 16 by beating several of the players he once called his own.

"This was a very, very difficult game to coach, from the standpoint that I'm as happy as I've ever been but I'm as sad as I've ever been," Matta said, reflecting then on the current Xavier seniors he had recruited there. "I feel bad that I was there for those guys' first college game, and I was there for the last one, you think of the irony of all of it."

Cont'd...
 
Upvote 0
I saw the comment about the job openings in this morning's Enquirer. IMO Thad should go easy on the Sean Miller props. No need to piss off one of the better fan bases in Ohio anymore than he already has. Could be a case of getting some revenge for spending a weekend with Xavier fans screaming insults at him, but if Miller leaves X this year for a Big 10 program there'll be death threats on him.

The game was just what I was afraid would happen in this tournament. As good as these kids are, they're still very young as a team and it really showed yesterday.

I was really afraid they were going to hit Oden with an intentional foul. It was a smart play to get the foul as quickly as he did as it was the only chance the Bucks had... and he made sure the refs would call it, had to call it... but it looked excessive on the screen. Anybody have a better view?
 
Upvote 0
cincibuck;786255; said:
I saw the comment about the job openings in this morning's Enquirer. IMO Thad should go easy on the Sean Miller props. No need to piss off one of the better fan bases in Ohio anymore than he already has. Could be a case of getting some revenge for spending a weekend with Xavier fans screaming insults at him, but if Miller leaves X this year for a Big 10 program there'll be death threats on him.
Click to expand...
I would assume he's probably praising a coach he respects rather than trying to stick it to some stupid hecklers yesterday :roll2: Why isn't Miller a valid name to bring up for job opening talk?
 
Upvote 0
Exactly. Fuck Xavier and their fans. Some of the crap they were spewing at Matta was just foul. Thad made a smart career decision when he chose Ohio State. If Xavier wants to be in the dance year in and year out, they have to compensate coaches who can get them there. You always hear everyone crying about the term "mid-major." If you want a "major" program you have to spend "major" money! Tell the boosters and alumni from X, that seem to think their degrees are made of gold, to start ponying up some cash to the athletic department for better facilities and more coaching salaries. Miller is gone within the next two years unless he gets the money he deserves. I wouldn't blame him or anyone else a bit.
 
Upvote 0
Just my observations from the game. I was sitting with mostly Louisville and Xavier fans around me and they all were very arogant. Xavier fans kept talking trash about Florida beating OSU in football (i dont even think Xavier has a football team, but i'm not sure). They had the typicall cincinati attitude talkin alot of smack like they have history or tradition and attacking OSU because we actually do and they dont.
 
Upvote 0
Cincy

XU: Present painful, future isn't
As long offseason looms, so does root of optimism
BY DUSTIN DOW | [email protected]
http://del.icio.us/post
1x1.gif

There are about seven months on the calendar until the start of practice for the 2007-08 college basketball season.
Right now that seems like countless days for Xavier's returning players to think about what might have been had the Musketeers somehow survived to defeat No. 1 seed Ohio State in the second round of the NCAA Tournament on Saturday.
The heartbreaking overtime defeat sent Xavier into the offseason with a familiar "what if" feeling that manifested after Xavier lost to Duke in the 2004 regional finals.

Cont'd...
 
Upvote 0
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top