Don’t worry Ohio State basketball fans, the sky is not falling just yet

Many are frustrated with what we’ve seen from the Ohio State basketball team as of late. But just wait, the season will turn around.

The Ohio State basketball team has hit a January skid. Call it the Fiesta Bowl curse, the physical brand in the Big Ten, or growing pains. No matter the case, the Buckeyes have lost four in a row on the court and have yet to win a game in the calendar year of 2020.

Apparently hindsight is not 2020.

OSU raced out to an 11-1 record, but now sit at 11-5 overall, and a surprising and disappointing 1-4 in the Big Ten. Despite a national ranking of eleventh before the loss at Indiana, it sits in a last-place tie with Northwestern in the Big Ten standings.

Can you hear the splashes of all the bandwagon fans jumping off the ship?

I’m here to tell you to take a deep breath. Things are not as bad as they appear. Yes, it’s a hard, hard truth that this team has some things to work out. The team is actually a tad younger than even last year, and you have to expect some of the new players to struggle with consistency. It’s really not a surprise. Turnovers and bad shooting have plagued the team as of late and there’s no way to swim around that.

But there are reasons.

The schedule as of late has not been kind. The Buckeyes have only lost one game at home in totality (a root canal at the hands of Wisconsin), but three on the road in conference. I don’t have to tell you how hard it is to win on the road in this league — especially this year, one in which the Big Ten is so deep. One only needs to look at Michigan State going down in a heap Sunday by almost thirty points at Purdue for evidence. Or you could point to the fact that Big Ten home teams are winning at an astounding rate this season, more so than anyone can remember.

I’ve seen people actually calling for Chris Holtmann’s job now after a four-game losing streak. Those people simply don’t know basketball, the Big Ten, or human nature at all.

Everything will be fine.

This team still has the pieces to make a run in March. It’s in a bit of a hole now that will make it difficult to win the Big Ten, but the schedule will begin to get a little easier starting Tuesday with a home game against Nebraska. There’s a tough game at Penn State after, but what follows is at home vs. Minnesota, At Northwestern, and home against Indiana. Look for the Buckeyes to claw back close to .500 after the next few games.

It’ll still be a long road to get back up in the upper division of the Big Ten, but this year even finishing with a losing record in-conference can get you into the NCAA Tournament.

This team will get better, and all of those fans and critics calling for knee-jerk changes in a still very young Big Ten campaign will grow silent.