Men's Basketball
Buckeyes Stop Irish Behind Turner's 28 and Gritty Defensive Effort
By John PorentasBy Monday the Buckeyes (6-0) will no longer be the best unranked team in college basketball. That's because they will undoubtedly crack the top-25 after a week in which they defeated No. 21 Miami on the road and No. 7 Notre Dame on a neutral court in Indianapolis.
OSU's latest accomplishment is a 67-62 win over the No. 7 Irish. The win was made possible by a great game plan by OSU Head Coach Thad Matta and his staff and great execution by sophomore guard Evan Turner.
While preparing for Notre Dame Matta and his staff noticed that Irish switched almost every screen. That, they concluded, was opportunity. If they ran the right shooters past screens, they could dictate which defender was trying to check their scorers.
"They're a team that switches a lot of their screens," said Matta.
The chief beneficiary of the strategy was Turner. Turner was able to take advantage of the switches by driving the basketball when he had the right defender on him or by getting to the offensive glass when he ended up with a defender on him that could not keep him off the boards. The result was a game-high 28-point performance by Turner that included five offensive rebounds and 10 second-chance points by the Buckeyes in the second half.
"There were going to be opportunities to offensive rebound just through the switching," said Matta.
"I think that Evan and Dallas and B. J. did a great job of trying to exploit that."
Notre Dame Head Coach Mike Brey recognized the success of the OSU strategy.
"In the course of their offense we got switched and had a smaller guy at the end of a clock and he shot over the top of our guys," said Brey.
"Switching is really pretty good for us and it's helped us be successful (but) we probably have to find a happy medium. We're maybe over switching a little bit. He really took advantage of some matchups," Brey said.
Turner's slashing and rebounding led the OSU offense but the Buckeyes got offensive contributions from Lauderdale and Mullens in the post and William Buford at guard. Lauderdale and Mullens combined for 17 points in the post, 11 from Mullens and six from Lauderdale. Buford, meanwhile, was pressed into action early in the first half when starter Jon Diebler picked up his second foul just 4:05 into the game. Buford responded with nine first-half points.
The Irish held the early advantage behind the play of Big East Player of the Year Luke Harangody. Harangody scored six of Notre Dame's first eight points as the Irish got out to a quick 8-2 lead.
Harangody continued his strong play and recorded a double-double of 15 points and 11 rebounds at the half, but Harongody wasn't getting much help from his teammates. That's because the OSU zone defense was set to take away Notre Dame's outside threats, guards Kyle McAlarney and Ryan Ayers. The Buckeyes picked up the Irish perimeter players at half court or before to prevent open threes. Their press was rewarded with turnovers which resulted in easy transition baskets. In the first half, those scores fueled an OSU run that erased a 25-19 Notre Dame lead and let the Buckeyes take a 30-28 half time lead.
"We turned it over against the press in the first half when we had control of the game and that kind of changed momentum," said Brey.
"Even though we only turned it over 10 times it probably stopped us from attacking the press as much the rest of the game," Brey said.
The Buckeyes took control in the second half as Turner scored 20 of his 28 after the intermission. He took advantage of the mismatches created by the OSU offense with offensive rebounds for easy baskets and by putting the ball on the floor when smaller players ended up guarding him.
"I've been driving ever since I was a kid. It's not my first rodeo. I practice how I play. I drive if I see someone I kick it out, if I don't just go ahead and be aggressive and not second-guess anything. When you second-guess that's when you mess up," said Turner.
OSU led by 10 at 58-48 with 6:47 remaining to play but the Irish got an offensive boost from an unexpected source to make one last run. Point guard Tony Jackson knocked two three pointers and a free throw in the next four minutes. The second three pointer cut OSU's lead to 61-59 with 2:50 remaining.
A basket by Turner moved the lead back out to four, but another three pointer by Jackson cut it to one at 63-62 with just 26 seconds remaining in the game. Matta said after the game that the Buckeyes did not think Jackson, who scored 10 of his 13 points on three threes and a free throw in the last 6:47 of the game, would be able to hurt them from three.
"We said we were going to let Jackson shoot threes," said Matta.
The Buckeyes were able to seal the win with two defensive stops and four free throws, two by Turner to extend the lead to three and two more by Jeremie Simmons with three seconds left to play to put the game out of reach. Turner said he wasn't surprised that the Irish were able to put together a final run at the Buckeyes, but OSU's newly found mental toughness helped them hold on for the win.
"We knew we had to be tough. The tougher team wins the game. We were fortunate to out-tough them in some areas," said Turner.
"Basketball is a game of runs and there's always that guy Mo on your side or against you, so momentum goes with you and against you. I figured they weren't going to go down without a fight.
"They're a top team, a tough basketball team. They made a play, it's how we react.
"We could have reacted negatively and they could have went up seven on us, or we could have reacted how we did and just finished off the game."
Game Notes:
* Team Win: Turner was the offensive star, but Thad Matta characterized the win as a team win. The Buckeyes got contributions from William Buford in the first half, post players Dallas Lauderdale and B. J. Mullens, and from the entire lineup on the defensive end. At crunch time, Jeremie Simmons knocked down some clutch free throws. Matta is hoping to build on those contributions.
"We had guys make spurts, from Will early on to Evan to Dallas to B. J.. You just hope we can keep molding them together and learn how to play with each other," said Matta.
* Praising the Irish: Despite the OSU win, it was clear that Matta was impressed with Notre Dame, both before the game and after.
"Watching these guys play is like when you're in high school and you're 18-years old and the old timers come back and they just kick your rear end," said Matta.
"They can shoot, they can pass, they don't make mistakes."
Matta said that before the game, the Buckeyes were focused on stopping their three-point threat Kyle McAlarney.
"We played Duke and we feared him more than we did J. J. Redick in his ability to get it off as quickly as possible," said Matta.
"I called the guys Wednesday night and said we need to start finding number 23 tonight. He is a game-changer. I haven't seen too many like him."
* Drawing on Experience: The Buckeyes are young, but as Evan Turner said, it isn't their first rodeo. It would have been easy for OSU to come into the Notre Dame game a little flat after their big win over Miami this week, but they drew on an experience of last year to prevent that.
"We talked about last year in the NIT where we beat Syracuse and then got beat by Texas A&M the next night by about 27," said Turner.
"We said lets not repeat. These games mean a lot for March."
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