The Ohio State men’s basketball team will be representing more than just the Scarlet and Gray when they take the court tonight to face N.C. State. They will be representing the entire Big Ten.

This is the first year the Buckeyes (2-0) will participate in the third annual ACC-Big Ten Challenge, a series of nine games where teams from each of the two conferences square off against one another. The conference that tallies the most wins is considered the victor. The ACC narrowly won the challenge the first two years, going 5-4 each time.

Although the game may mean a lot for the conference on a national level, the team is trying to stay focused on winning for their own reasons.

“We’re representing the conference and we want to do that well,” said coach Jim O’Brien, “but we can’t lose sight of the fact that this is about us as well.

“We’re playing a team from a quality conference that has a very good reputation,” O’Brien added. “I think they’re going to have a really good season so a win against a team that is going to finish strong will always help us down the road in this RPI thing everybody always wants to talk about.”

His players agreed, noting the significance of this game as opposed to those against the first two opponents the Buckeyes played – Winthrop and Albany.

“I know it is going to be a big game, probably the biggest game we play until the Big Ten season starts,” said freshman forward Terence Dials. “We have to go out there and play hard and get the win.”

N.C. State (5-0) will have one advantage over the Bucks – their early season schedule that has allowed them to play five games already, compared to only two for OSU.

“They’ve had a bunch of lopsided scores so far this year, so I don’t really know how much they’ve been tested,” O’Brien said. “But we haven’t been tested that much either.”

N.C. State features a fairly young, athletic team that tries to push the tempo when possible. They start two highly-touted freshman: McDonald’s All-American Julius Hodge, a 6-foot-6-inch guard who has excellent scoring ability, and Josh Powell, a 6-foot-9-inch forward who is an aggressive rebounder.

Hodge and Powell are second and third in scoring, at 11.8 and 11.2 points per game, respectively.

Another of their key players, senior guard Archie Miller, hails from Beaver Falls, Pa., the same hometown that produced OSU freshman Brandon Fuss-Cheatham.

“I’ve known (Miller) forever … since I was about five-years-old,” Fuss-Cheatham said. “I played against him so many times when I was younger, and now that we’re in college obviously the game is going to be important, but I don’t think it will be too weird.”

One thing that O’Brien thinks may be a little weird about the game tonight is the offensive strategy N.C. State plans to bring.

The offense the Wolfpack has used so far this season is an up-tempo one, but when that is not working, they turn to a Princeton-like style of play involving a lot of cuts, screens and shots from beyond the arc.

This is a different look from past N.C. State teams.

“It is a little interesting they’re trying to do that this year because (that offense) takes a little while to master,” O’Brien said.

It has worked well for the Pack so far this season. They have won their five games by an average of 23.4 points.

The Buckeyes have won their two games by an average of 24. 5 points.

The game is scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m. in the the Schottenstein Center. It will be nationally-televised on ESPN2.