Everyone on the court seemed to be wondering the same thing Saturday: When is Michigan State going to miss a shot? That time never came as the Spartans topped the Ohio State men’s basketball team 84-70 in Columbus.
“I think we kept waiting for them to miss instead of getting out harder and making them miss,” OSU guard Tony Stockman said.
Even the Spartans thought they would have to miss a basket eventually.
“Sooner or later you think you’re going to miss one, but we stayed pretty consistent,” Michigan State guard Chris Hill said.
Michigan State coach Tom Izzo called the Spartans 73.3 percent shooting “ridiculous.”
“We played well, we shot the ball well, and I thought we executed well,” Izzo said. “I don’t think it was bad defense (on OSU’s part).”
After securing an 18-point lead at halftime, the Spartans became susceptible to Stockman’s three-point shots that he has been getting credit for in OSU’s past three games.
Stockman put up three shots from behind the arc in a matter of two minutes and 46 seconds. Guard Brandon Fuss-Cheatham added another three-pointer during that time, and the efforts allowed the Buckeyes to move within 11 points of Michigan State with 12:09 remaining.
Even though the Spartans did not stop putting points on the board, they followed up an 80.8 percent first half shooting attempt with a 63.2 percent second half.
“When you need to come back, every possession – offensive and defensive – you can’t take a possession off, and we just didn’t guard properly,” OSU coach Jim O’Brien said. “It was just too much of a hole to keep fighting out of.”
The first half established the flow and outcome of the game. Michigan State had two players with 13 points each and four players who had put up at least one good three-point attempt heading into the locker room.
A balanced scoring attack made it tough to guard Michigan State – five players finished the game in double digits with Maurice Ager leading the way with 18. Respectively, Hill and Kelvin Torbert followed close behind with 16 and 15 points.
“We have done a really good job of moving the ball,” Izzo said. “We have some talented perimeter players, and they are very unselfish.”
OSU tried almost every defense imaginable to somehow shut down the Spartans’ shooting accuracy. After starting the game in a zone defense, the Buckeyes quickly realized Michigan State was getting too many open outside shots. They then tried a man-to-man approach.
“We played zone early because of size and matchup problems,” O’Brien said. “I think in the first half it was a combination of us not being as aggressive as we needed to be. I thought they got a lot of open opportunities, but more than that was their ability to make shots.”
The Buckeyes committed only six fouls in the first half, while the Spartans racked-up 14. Many of Michigan State’s fouls were drawn by OSU’s Velemir Radinovic at the post position. Radinovic took seven free throws in the first.
The inside presence that Radinovic and Terence Dials gave the Buckeyes was something the Spartans wanted to prevent.
“We tried the three-quarter front which helped on our weak side,” Izzo said. “Both Dials and Radinovic have really improved their games. Now that Stockman is hitting shots – which he wasn’t earlier in the season – it is going to make them harder to cover.”
Radinovic and Dials combined for 30 points, while Stockman had 18.
The problem for OSU, though, was the Spartans’ ability to strip the ball and block shots when OSU’s bigger men got the ball by the basket. Dials was credited with six turnovers.
“I felt we got enough touches,” Radinovic said. “We didn’t finish plays or play tough enough the whole game.”
In order to stop the Spartans, OSU used four guards and only one forward with 14 minutes remaining. While O’Brien said he still feels the need to have both Radinovic and Dials in the game, he needed to take one out for defensive guarding reasons.
The Buckeyes fell to 3-6 in the Big Ten while the Spartans increased to 7-2.
OSU has a week to recover before having to play four of its next five games on the road. The Buckeyes will play Wisconsin at 7 p.m. Saturday in Madison.
