Basketball Preview: Ohio State at No. 22 Purdue

By Tim Shoemaker on January 21, 2016 at 8:35 am
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Ohio State was fortunate last week to have the opportunity to play a lowly Rutgers team directly following a 25-point blowout loss at the hands of Indiana. The Buckeyes aren't quite as lucky this time around.

WHO WHERE WHEN TV
Purdue 16-3 (4-2) Mackey Arena (West Lafayette, Ind.) 9 p.m. ESPN

Coming off another crushing defeat — this time a 35-point loss to Maryland on Saturday — Ohio State gets a much more formidable opponent this time in the rebound game. The Buckeyes travel to Purdue for a 9 p.m. date with the 22nd-ranked Boilermakers at Mackey Arena on Thursday.

“I think as a team we’re definitely hungry to get back out there," sophomore forward Jae'Sean Tate said Wednesday. "In practice this week we’ve been going at it really hard, just trying to become a tougher basketball team. This is another opportunity for us to face a top-25 team and prove to our fans and ourselves that we are one of the top teams in this conference.”

Both Ohio State and Purdue currently sit at 4-2 in the Big Ten — two games behind league-leading Indiana and Iowa in the loss column. But as the Buckeyes look to rebound from that embarrassing performance against the Terrapins last weekend, chasing the league title is the furthest thing from their minds. Instead, Ohio State is looking at Thursday's game as a chance to add a quality win to its resume.

Nothing more, nothing less. But it's not going to be easy.

"We have to know that it’s going to be a packed house tomorrow night, a crazy environment and embrace that, have fun with it," Buckeyes head coach Thad Matta said. "Get back to playing our best basketball.”

Opponent Breakdown

It's pretty simple when playing against Purdue: Opposing teams better be able to match the Boilermakers' size and physicality or they won't have a chance to win.

Purdue is massive inside — regularly starting the 7-foot A.J. Hammons at center alongside the 6-foot-9 Caleb Swanigan. When either needs a break, the Boilermakers have the luxury of bringing the 7-foot-2 Isaac Haas off the bench.

It's a nightmare for opposing teams to deal with.

"They are huge," Matta said of Purdue. "We’ve got to do a great job, the best job we can with our post defense. Those guys are hard to move down there. It’s no secret, you look at their shot totals and they’re going to get the ball inside to those guys."

Hammons (13.4 points per game), Haas (10.9) and Swanigan (10.4) are the team's three top scorers. This isn't a huge surprise as head coach Matt Painter rotates his towering trio constantly to keep them fresh and active.

But the three big guys for the Boilermakers also have help. Sophomore forward Vince Edwards along with reigning Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year, senior guard Rapheal Davis, give Purdue length and athleticism on the wings while junior guard Kendall Stephens adds a scoring punch off the bench.

With all of their size and athleticism, it's not surprising the Boilermakers are the top defensive team in the Big Ten. Purdue allows a league-best 60.8 points per game (65.5 in league play) and opponents shoot just 36.4 percent from the field (42.3 in league play). The Boilermakers rank fifth nationally in adjusted defensive efficiency and are KenPom's No. 8 overall team.

“Definitely going to be a physical game," Tate said. "They’re a team who likes to utilize their bigs and they’ve got three pretty great bigs over there so it’s definitely going to have to be a physical game and a do your work early game because of their size.”

Buckeye Breakdown

Not a whole lot went right for Ohio State against Maryland in a game that turned out to be the worst loss suffered in the Matta era. The Buckeyes were blasted by the Terrapins, plain and simple.

The recent struggles have been at the defensive end for Ohio State. The Buckeyes were one of the Big Ten's top teams on that end of the floor prior to the last three games, but Ohio State has only played one good half out of its last six.

Over the last three games, the Buckeyes are giving up 84.3 points per game as teams are shooting 49.1 percent from the field and 39.4 percent from behind the 3-point line. It's pretty clear those numbers are not going to get the job done.

“I’m expecting us to come in there and play hard all 40 minutes. Coming out from the jump, start playing hard from the jump. Not waiting until the second media timeout or anything like that," freshman point guard JaQuan Lyle said. "Just trying to play hard the entire game, I feel like we haven’t done that in a while and we need to get back to doing that.”

Ohio State will need to do all that and more against the heavily favored Boilermakers.

How It Plays Out

It's not the fact that the Buckeyes are losing some of these games — at Indiana and at Maryland are hardly 'bad losses' — but it's the way Ohio State is losing that is so concerning. The Buckeyes haven't even been competitive in two of their last three games and if you're an Ohio State fan that's what is so disappointing.

We've written it being hard to imagine that happening again on a few different occasions already this season, but that's clearly not the case. What kind of effort the Buckeyes show really is anybody's guess at this point in the season.

Ultimately, though, Purdue is the better basketball team right now and it is playing at home. The Boilers are riding high after a 50-point win their last time out and they will use that momentum and the energy provided by the hostile Mackey Arena crowd to their advantage.

It's hard to imagine this game being high scoring because that's just not how Purdue plays. Points will be hard to come by for the Buckeyes, but the Boilermakers will be able to score enough to win comfortably.


Tim's prediction: Purdue 67, Ohio State 58

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