On Kyrie Irving and the Comeback Kids
February 22, 2012The Buckeyes March Forecast: Cloudy
February 22, 2012It was a typical Tuesday night of late for the Ohio State Buckeyes. The scarlet and gray won their third straight Tuesday night game in as many weeks, following up 87 points against Purdue at home in a three point win and 78 at Minnesota last week in a blowout with 83 last night. The Bucks shot 65% from the field, their second best clip of the season, as they flattened the already deflating Illinois Fighting Illini 83-67, who have now lost 9 of their last 10 games. The win, if anything, slows the bleeding on the Buckeyes’ fall from grace as a result of their pair of losses to the state of Michigan. The problem for the Buckeyes following their last two Tuesdays? It’s been carrying that offensive efficiency into the weekend.
From the tip, the gameplan was different for Matta’s guys. The ball wasn’t sticking and there was not a reliance on forced and contested jump shots. Instead, there was dribble penetration from Aaron Craft that fueled it all. One of my biggest criticisms of the Buckeye offense in recent games has been their lack of attacking the defense via the dribble drive. Tonight, Craft gave a flashback to late last season when he was consistently in double figure scoring and probing the defense regularly. The sophomore point posted 11 points, 5 rebounds, 5 assists, and 3 steals. OSU jumped out to a 28-8 lead in the game’s first nine minutes, hitting 11 of their first 12 shots, and the game was never in doubt after that.
I said last night on Twitter that William Buford shouldn’t take another shot this season that didn’t come from a curl off a pick. The more I thought about it, the more I realized how effective he is off the curl and how he seems to forget about that shot when he’s struggling from the perimeter. When Buford does get the ball on the perimeter, he seems to have greater success off the slip screen handoff from Craft than when he’s sizing up a defender 1-on-1. Buford finished with 17 points on 7-of-9 shooting, and to his credit, he played within himself.
It appears that Coach Matta changed his rotation up a bit tonight as Craft and freshman Shannon Scott played about 15 minutes together. Scott took some minutes from Lenzelle Smith Jr. as Craft slid over and played primarily shooting guard with the two on the court at the same time. Scott’s 3 rebounds, 4 assists, and 1 steal helped the cause in 22 minutes, but his shooting (0-for-5 last night) is holding him back as teams increasingly ignore him on the perimeter. Sam Thompson still got 11 minutes and squeezed in an alley-oop slam in the first half along with a power rejection in the second half. He played more small forward minutes, however, as his minutes came at the expense of Buford, who was on the court for 26 minutes. Given his recent struggles, I think it’s a good idea to prevent Buford from playing 35+ minutes if at all possible.
The surprising result of more aggressiveness out of the guards, three point shots falling (7-of-15 on the evening), and Deshaun Thomas’s effortless inside out scoring (he led the team with 19 points on 6-of-8 shooting) was a surprising lack of touches for Jared Sullinger. I’ve been quite criticial of the Buckeyes for not giving their best player the ball more often. In this game, Sullinger had just 3 first half points and finished with 9 points (a season low, with the exception of the South Carolina game where he left due to injury) on 7 shots. Sully played 27 minutes, and he fouled out for the first time this season with five minutes to go. His third foul was of the flagrant one variety, coming after video review determined that the bucket he scored included a vicious elbow to Meyers Leonard’s jaw. Solely a basketball play with no malicious intent, the referees completely whiffed on the interpretation of the rule there in my opinion. Immediately following that, Sullinger picked up an offensive foul by sealing Leonard on a lob pass for his fourth foul with 11 minutes remaining.
Leonard was the lone consistent threat for the Fighting Illini. He was the beneficiary of multiple garbage baskets and a couple of easy baskets over Ravenel and Williams. Meyers finished with 21 points on 7-of-12 shooting and 5 rebounds. Brandon Paul had nowhere near the 43-point explosion he did in Champaign, finishing with 9 points on 2-of-9 shooting. The Illini made just 3-of-18 three point shots, and the two things that kept this game within 20 points were 12 offensive boards for Illinois and the 17 Buckeye turnovers, several coming in the final minutes.
Finally, freshman swingman LaQuinton Ross logged five minutes of garbage time at the end of this game. In that time, he had two impressive buckets as he created in the open floor and swooped one underhand bucket in as he was fouled. He added five quick points so effortlessly, and it’s the reason why I wish the circumstances were different and Ross could see meaningful playing time. Ross could truly help the Buckeyes on nights when Buford, Smith Jr., etc. aren’t hitting their shots, playing much of the same role that Deshaun Thomas played last season as a spark of instant offense off the bench. It remains to be seen if Thad will pull out all the stops, including Ross, if his back is up against the wall in an elimination game.
The Bucks will look to avoid a third straight weekend loss when they host Bo Ryan and the Wisconsin Badgers Sunday afternoon for Senior Day.
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(Photo: Jay LaPrete/AP)
1 Comment
our offense doing well against bad teams doesn’t do much for me. Izzo figured out how to beat us and Michigan copied it. hopefully, we can figure out a counter before we play Sparty again.