BLOOMINGTON, IND. – It resembled the 15th round of a boxing match with the two teams as the beaten and bloodied pugilists simply trying to get out of the ring on guts, guile and character alone.
Saturday night, the gutsier team turned out to be the Ohio State Buckeyes, (12-13, 4-8 Big Ten) who went punch for punch with the Indiana Hoosiers and their Assembly Hall crowd. The Buckeyes put the game away with 17 seconds remaining when J.J. Sullinger sank a short jump shot to complete the 59-56 victory.
Velimir Radinovic had the game of his life, leading the Buckeyes while scoring a career-high 23 points, with 19 of those coming in the second half. Terence Dials was second for the Buckeyes in scoring, putting up 16 points along with sharing a team-best 10 rebounds with Radinovic.
The Buckeyes took advantage of Indiana’s missing center, Sean Kline, who was out with a knee injury.
“They were definitely undermanned tonight; they lost Kline to a knee injury so we made a concerted effort to go inside, and our guys were great finding us throughout the whole game,” Radinovic said. “We were just able to capitalize on those looks.”
OSU coach Jim O’Brien was happy with the performances of his two big men.
“Regardless of how many points Velimir and Terence score, the thing that I am most happy with is they took 28 shots together, and that hasn’t happened,” he said.
The lead changed 12 times during the game, and the largest lead either team was able to reach was Indiana’s six in the first half.
Indiana couldn’t shoot at all throughout the entire game. Guard Bracey Wright, who scored 28 when these two teams met in Columbus on Jan. 20, shot 1-for-12 from the field and 1-for-6 from behind the three-point arc. The Hoosiers as a team only shot 33 percent.
“To be at home, you would think I would shoot well. Since we’re in this gym so much, I’d have it mastered, the art of shooting in this gym,” Wright said. “Before every game I talk to myself and I tell myself that I am going to play strong and that I am going to knock down every shot I take. When we start, the basket is regulation size, as I miss it gets smaller and smaller and by the time the end of the game comes it looks like I am shooting the basketball into a cup of water.”
O’Brien credited his defense with stopping Wright.
“I think (Wright) is very difficult to guard, and everybody kind of needed to help on him,” he said. “So I was really happy with how we guarded him; we were a little bit tougher defensively than we’ve been.”
OSU shot an even 50 percent in the game with most of those shots coming from inside the paint as OSU dominated IU big men George Leach and A.J. Moye for 40 points from down low.
“We definitely tried to isolate Moye,” Dials said. “He’s a shorter big man so we knew we had the advantage.”
The Hoosiers and their coach Mike Davis tried everything they could defensively to stop the Buckeyes down low.
“We haven’t stopped anyone in the paint all year,” he said. “Everybody we play has a career night against us in the post. It’s the same thing.”
It just didn’t matter what Davis tried as Dials and Radinovic were too strong, and they knew it too.
“I did a great job the first half and then they started doubling, and Velimir just had an awesome game in the second half.” Dials said. “He played probably his best game ever, so when you have that combination it’s going to be tough to stop us.”
At the end of the game Moye had a chance to give the Hoosiers the lead, but his three-point attempt from the top of the arc bounced off the rim. Dials hauled down the rebound and was fouled. After Dials sunk one of two free throws, Wright chucked a prayer from half-court that went unanswered and the Hoosiers ran off the court to a chorus of boos from the home crowd of 17,093.
Both teams entered the game reeling from losing streaks with OSU ending its three-game streak and IU losing its fourth in a row and its sixth in seven.
O’Brien attempted to rally his troops by starting rarely-used guard Shaun Smith over Sullinger as well as starting Ivan Harris in place of Brandon Fuss-Cheatham.
“At first I think (Sullinger) really did respond. I think he made some terrific plays,” O’Brien said. “We lost three games in a row and we just needed to change things up.”
“I thought (Harris) played very well in his last game against Iowa,” he said. “Smith has been an emotional leader and I thought that Smith played very well in the game against Iowa.”
Davis took the blame upon himself.
“We can’t go over the hump,” he said. “We’re just not getting it done. I’m not getting it done. We had a situation where we were down two, and we had a wide-open path to the basket. I’m just not getting it done.”
OSU has now swept both of its games in the state of Indiana, against IU and Purdue and is undefeated when the Big Ten Tournament is held in Indianapolis after winning it in 2002. The tournament returns to Conseco Fieldhouse this March.
