Coming off a hard fought loss to No. 3 Notre Dame, the Buckeyes rebounded with a 105-76 trouncing of in-state rival Cincinnati thanks to a second-half surge.
The win was an all-around team effort. Six different Buckeyes scored in double figures, led by Shayla Cooper's 18-points.
The junior shot 9-11 from the field and pulled down three rebounds, most coming first half. She played just over a minute in the third quarter and sat the remainder of the game. "She just wasn't the one I wanted in the game in the second half," said OSU head coach Kevin McGuff.
Cooper has been a bright spot for this team all season. She leads the team with two double-doubles on the season and has a pair of 15 rebound games. The forward has been the only consistent back-court presence on this undersized Buckeye team – a problem, according to McGuff.
| Team | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | f |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ohio state | 20 | 25 | 33 | 27 | 105 |
| Cincinnati | 18 | 20 | 20 | 18 | 76 |
"We need to find a little more around the basket than just (Cooper)," said McGuff following the teams 75-72 loss to No. 3 Notre Dame, in which Cooper scored 18 points and accounted for 44% of the team's total rebounds. Sunday afternoon, he got his wish as Alexa Hart turned in perhaps the most impressive performance of the game.
The sophomore forward scored 14 points, pulled down a team-high nine rebounds, and swatted five shots – half the team's total. When she's on her game, Hart is one of the better defensive post players in the country. Last season, she recorded a school record 129 blocked-shots, and she has now blocked a shot in 28-consecutive games.
Makayla Waterman also played well down-low. The redshirt freshman came off the bench and scored 11 points with six rebounds. "She has a high IQ for the game," said Kelsey Mitchell after the game. "A lot of people don't see the passes that she makes, or the IQ she has when people are cutting – the small stuff that a lot of fours or fives don't necessarily have, I think she has that gift."
Defensively, the Buckeyes shut down the Bearcats as a team. They held UC to 33% from the field and allowed just two points in transition. However, Ana Owens, Cincinnati's prolific scorer, proved impossible to stop. The sophomore led all scorers with 35 points – the most Ohio State has allowed an opposing player all season.
The other news of the game was the return of freshman captain Kianna Holland. Holland saw her first action since the Buckeyes hosted No. 1 Connecticut, Nov. 16th. She played 18 minutes and scored eight points. The Duke transfer missed five consecutive games with what the team called soreness in her surgically-repaired knee. According to an Ohio State spokesman, her inactivity has been mostly precautionary after she missed the entire 2014 season with an ACL injury.
Holland's return is huge for the Buckeyes, especially after the announcement that freshman guard Kaylan Pugh has left the team. We saw last year what roster-depletion can do to a talented squad, and it's not something McGuff and his squad want to go through again.
Next up for the Buckeyes is a home contest against North Carolina A&T, Sunday afternoon. After facing top-10 teams in four of its first seven games, Ohio State closes its non-conference slate with all unranked opponents before opening conference play against No. 19 Michigan State, New Year's Eve.
