Ohio State can’t beat Michigan at home with its best player out, head coach suspended

This team is headed in the wrong direction.

As an Ohio State basketball fan, watching this team this season has to be frustrating. There have been times when the Buckeyes have looked like the best team in the league. Unfortunately, like today, OSU has failed to play winning basketball on both ends of the court. That’s what happened against Michigan Sunday in a 75-69 loss.

Ohio State seemed to grab relative control of the game late in the first half when it went on an 8-0 run to take a seven-point lead into halftime. The next twenty minutes was another story, however. The Wolverines came out and made OSU work on the offensive end, allowing the Buckeyes to only score seven points in a whopping ten minutes of play.

Meanwhile, Michigan was able to take advantage of a Buckeye defense that simply couldn’t figure out dribble drives and pick and roll plays, often leaving the Wolverines with some very, very good looks.

The Buckeyes tried to make a run to make things interesting at the end of the game, but it was too little, too late against a team without its best player and head coach suspended. At home. And now, Ohio State can kiss a double-bye in the Big Ten Tournament goodbye. If OSU can somehow find some consistency it’s been lacking as of late, it’ll need to win four games in four days.

Malaki Branham led the Buckeyes with eighteen points, but it was a quiet eighteen that also included three of OSU’s thirteen turnovers for the game. E.J. Liddell had sixteen points on just 4-of-10 shooting in what was likely his last game in Value City Arena.

With the loss, Ohio State continues its painful limp to the end of the regular season, falling to 19-10 overall and 12-8 in the conference. It’s hard to see any scenario where this team makes any kind of deep run in tournament play.

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