Men's Basketball
Veteran Buckeyes Hoping to Make Some Noise in The Garden
By Brandon CastelOhio State basketball coach Thad Matta has been here before, taking his team on the road to play two ranked teams on national television in one of the most historic venues in all of basketball.
Two years ago, Matta took his team into Madison Square Garden to play No. 21 Syracuse and No. 15 Texas A&M. The Buckeyes won the first game 79-65 over the Orange, but lost the second game 70-47 in one of the ugliest performances of the Matta’s coaching tenure in Columbus.
Thad Matta
Photo by Jim Davidson“I’m never watching the Texas A&M game again,” Matta said as he blocked out the memory of a second half where his team missed 18 of its first 19 field goal tries against the Aggies.
The Buckeyes (2-0) played five freshmen in that game, along with two other first year players (P.J. Hill and Kyle Madsen) and two second-year guys (David Lighty and Othello Hunter), but they will take the court Thursday night against defending national champion North Carolina (9:30 p.m. ET, ESPN2) with a roster that includes three scholarships seniors and four juniors.
“There’s more of a knowing. I think all young guys when they go into situations are nervous and maybe also have a false sense of confidence because they just don’t know what’s coming at them,” Matta said.
“As you continue to play game after game after game and you go into the tough environments these guys have been in, you just have more to draw from, of saying, ‘This game is like that game my freshman year or my sophomore year or my junior year.’ You’ve got more to draw a parallel to get yourself ready to play.”
Matta joked before the trip to New York City that he wasn’t sure if his young team even knew how to operate the hotel key cards, let alone handle the atmosphere at what the Buckeye coach calls “the Mecca of basketball.”
Jon Diebler in his freshman season against Syracuse in Madison Square Garden
Photo by Jim Davidson“My freshman year, I remember going into Madison Square Garden and I was thinking like, ‘Man, (Michael) Jordan has played on this court, LeBron (James), Kobe (Bryant). I was just shocked to be out there,’ ” said Jon Diebler, who went 0-for-9 shooting as a freshman that night against the Aggies, including 0-of-7 behind the arc.
“But now we’ve all been in the big game, we’ve had big wins against good teams and we know what to expect going into the game and I can honestly say from my experience in the past, especially my freshman year, we weren’t prepared for that because we had just never been through something like that. Now we’ve all been through it, so I think it helps a lot.”
The 2007-08 Buckeyes lost seven straight against ranked opponents – including a 66-55 to the No. 1-ranked Tar Heels in Columbus – before knocking off No. 15 Purdue and No. 18 Michigan State in back-to-back games at Value City Arena to close out the regular season.
However, it was their back-to-back wins on the road against No. 22 Miami (Fla.) and No. 7 Notre Dame early last December that got this team over the hump on their way to a return trip to the NCAA Tournament.
“I think it just gave us a lot of confidence, especially early on in the season, getting a couple big wins like that,” said Diebler, who is averaging 14.5 points per game this season while shooting 53 percent from the field and 58 percent from behind the arc.
“Especially in this game (against UNC) it’s an early opportunity for us to make some noise, not only for the Big Ten but around the country. We know we have an excellent opportunity at hand but we also know this is one game and we have another game right after that. So we’re focused on North Carolina right now and it is an opportunity for us to make some noise.”
The Buckeyes are 2-0 on the season after beating Alcorn State 100-60 in the opener and James Madison 72-44, but they will have a chance to make a statement on the national stage this weekend as they face No. 4 UNC and the winner of the game between Cal and Syracuse in the 2K Sports College Hoops Classic benefiting Coaches vs. Cancer.“Most of them understand what’s at stake in the little two-game tournament that we have and what can happen coming out with two good wins for our team and our conference,” said Lighty, who is averaging 11 points, 2.5 rebounds and 5 assists in his first two games back from a broken foot that sidelined him for all but seven games a year ago.
The Tar Heels will obviously look like a much different team from the one that won the NCAA title in March after losing Tyler Hansbrough, Ty Lawson and Wayne Ellington to the NBA, but they do pose a serious threat to the Buckeyes because of their ability to rebound the basketball and get out in transition.
“They just keep coming. They just keep coming in waves,” said Lighty, who scored 10 points and grabbed nine rebounds against UNC in 2007.
“They’ve got a lot of good players, they’re real athletic, real big, they’ve got size and they just have players that play their role and fit in good with their system.”
With a front court that includes 7-footer Tyler Zeller along with Ed Davis (6-10) and Deon Thompson (6-8), the Buckeyes will need to be at their best in the paint and on the glass. That means more Dallas Lauderdale, who played only 13 minutes in Ohio State’s first two games because of a hand injury.
“He’s coming along well and I think he’s getting more and more comfortable,” Matta said of his 6-8 junior.
“His first day back the other day I think he went after a couple balls with his left hand and I went over and said, ‘Vince (O’Brien), is he not able to use his right hand?’ and he says, ‘No, he’s fine. We’ve just got to get him accustomed to it,’ and quite honestly I haven’t seen in practice lately him use the one hand. I think he feels good with it now.”
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