PITTSBURGH – It was hard to picture a lower place for Jake Diebler and the Ohio State men’s basketball program to be.
Walking into the Petersen Events Center yields a lofty view of the court the Pitt basketball program calls home. Considering where the arena sits, nestled into the hilly campus landscape, it’s hard not to conjure up an image of descending down into the depths of the earth itself by the time you reach court level. It was down there, behind the bleachers behind the basket where the home team had just secured a season highlight win, that the Buckeyes had to grapple with their own demons.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementFor 20 minutes, undefeated Ohio State had done little to indicate it could win against a Pitt team that had most recently taken a loss to Quinnipiac on this same court. Then the Buckeyes rallied, grabbed a second-half lead and still held it when Damarco Minor fired off a contested, running 3-pointer at the buzzer.
Naturally, it found the bottom of the net. It set off a celebration, one that sent Ohio State’s Bruce Thornton to the floor as Pitt players sprinted onto the court to celebrate a second last-second 3-pointer against the Buckeyes in as many years.
Call it luck. Call it fate. But either way, call it a one-point loss for Ohio State on a night when nearly a month’s worth of efficient offense, growing positive vibes and steady improvement came crashing back down a notch in the type of loss the Buckeyes experienced one too many times a season ago.
Pittsburgh guard Damarco Minor shoots a 3-pointer to defeat Ohio State on Nov. 28.The final: Pitt 67, Ohio State 66.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“It hurts,” a tight-lipped Devin Royal said.
What hurts the most isn’t just the 3-pointer at the buzzer negating a putback by freshman Amare Bynum with 3.7 seconds left that was the game-winner until it wasn’t. It’s that, despite falling behind by 12 points during the first half and trailing by 10 at halftime, Ohio State (6-1) was unable to get a defensive stop in the final 5:50 of the game. After Omari Witherspoon’s missed jumper with 5:59 left was nabbed by Bruce Thornton, the Panthers (5-3) scored on their final nine offensive possessions of the game.
Five of them culminated with free throws, but the backbreaker came with Ohio State ahead 60-57 after a Royal spin and score from the right elbow. Pitt freshman forward Roma Siulepa extended his team’s possession twice, pulling down a 3-point miss by Witherspoon and then another from Barry Dunning Jr. Granted a third opportunity on the same possession, Dunning then finished it with a drive and score with 2:32 left.
Siulepa’s second offensive board of the possession gave him four of Pitt’s 16 for the game and helped keep the Panthers afloat.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“One play sticks out to my mind is when No. 13 got two offensive rebounds,” said Thornton, who pulled down a team- and career-high 13 rebounds. “Those types of moments that people don’t really see really hurt us on the back end. We made them miss shots. Stuff like that is very controllable.”
Ohio State took 15 fewer shots than Pitt. The Panthers shot 37.7% (26 for 69) and the Buckeyes shot 42.6% (23 for 54) in the losing effort. It wasn’t so much that Pitt was converting its offensive rebounds – Ohio State outscored Pitt 9-6 in second-chance points – but it was keeping the Buckeyes from getting its own shots.
Ohio State forward Devin Royal drives against Pittsburgh on Nov. 28.Diebler said the Buckeyes talked about two key statistics leading into the game: defensive rebounding and turnovers. Pitt’s 16 offensive rebounds are the most allowed by Ohio State this year, and Pitt turned 13 Ohio State turnovers into a 17-5 advantage in points off of giveaways.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“We said going into this game this game is going to come down to rebounding and turnover margin,” Diebler said. “We talked about it. We worked on it and we just didn’t do a good enough job.”
Now the Buckeyes have a week to prepare for their next game: a Big Ten opener at Northwestern on Dec. 6.
“I’m glad this team can experience it early and go back to the drawing board because Big Ten play is coming up,” Thornton said. “I’m glad we got an early dose now so when we go back to film and practice, we’ve got a whole week to understand what we need to do to go win on the road at Northwestern.”
Here are three more takeaways from Ohio State’s first loss of the season:
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementLast-possession defense couldn’t get the stop
After Bynum put his own miss back through the rim with 3.7 seconds left to break a 64-64 tie, Diebler called timeout rather than let Pitt immediately run its offense.
“I felt like we needed to get organized,” he said. “The big thing for us is we had a pretty good feel of what they were going to do. We knew it was either going to be a step-up ball screen or a pitch back. We talked about that in the timeout.”
Ohio State did not put a man on the inbounder, allowing Dunning to fire an uncontested pass to Minor at Ohio State’s 3-point line. As he crossed midcourt, with Thornton shadowing him and Royal picking up the trailing Dunning, Pitt’s Cameron Corhen’s presence near midcourt allowed Minor to create some separation as Thornton tried to keep him from driving.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“What we wanted to do was make them catch the ball going to the ball instead of catching it on the run and then at that point we needed to cut the ball and force them into a tough shot,” Diebler said. “It’s hard because in that situation they’re probably going to get a 3 off. You obviously don’t want to foul, so I thought we forced them into a pretty hard shot.”
The talk in that huddle had been on contesting the shot and making it as hard as possible without fouling, especially with the new continuation rules this year in college basketball that could send a player to the line for three free throws if he’s able to quickly get up a shot after being fouled.
“First thing, you don’t want to foul,” Thornton said. “You don’t want to give a player a wide-open look or a rhythm look. You don’t want to do anything too out of character (defensively). We could’ve cut the ball better and slowed them down a little bit because it was a screen behind me, but he made a tough shot.
“I contested it the best way I can.”
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementJohn Mobley’s status unknown; Bruce Thornton seemed fine
The Buckeyes played the majority of the game without their second-leading scorer. With 2:21 left in the first half, sophomore guard John Mobley Jr. was fouled on a jumper in the paint and landed awkwardly. He clutched his right ankle in pain, stayed in the game for the free throws but missed them both before subbing out and making his way to the bench with a heavy limp.
It was the end of the night for Mobley, who had made 22 of 23 free throws (95.7%) through the first six games. He finished with 3 points on 1-of-3 shooting, one rebound, a turnover and a steal in 13:57 after averaging 16.8 points per game to this point.
“We’re not sure,” Diebler said when asked about Mobley’s status. “I’m hopeful that’s all precautionary. I’d assume we’ll get a much more thorough evaluation of him, of Bruce there at the end, of (Christoph) Tilly as well.”
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementMobley limped out after halftime, did some work with a member of the training staff and went back to the locker room before returning with a walking boot on his right leg.
Thornton, meanwhile, had the misfortune of being near the Pitt bench when Minor’s 3-pointer set off a celebration. A Panther player clipped the back of his leg while charging onto the court, but Thornton indicated that he was fine and had no hard feelings about the moment.
“Yeah, I’ll be all right,” he said. “I got looked at by doc and got some ice on it so it don’t swell up, but I’ll be all right. They were trying to celebrate one of their teammates hitting a buzzer-beater. It wasn’t on purpose. Stuff like that happens.”
Tilly missed the second half of Ohio State’s win against Mount St. Mary’s on Nov. 25 for what Diebler said was a precautionary measure while dealing with an unspecified lower-body injury. He started and played 31:42 against the Panthers but was just 1 for 8 from the floor with three turnovers and no assists. Eight of his 10 points came on perfect shooting from the free-throw line.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementLike Notre Dame, Pitt limits Ohio State’s offensive efficiency
In five games against mid-major teams, the Buckeyes have averaged 98.2 points per game while averaging at least 122 points per 100 possessions. Now in a one-point win against Notre Dame and a one-point loss to Pitt, Ohio State has averaged 65.0 points and been held to fewer than 102 points per 100 possessions.
The Buckeyes actually had their lowest adjusted offensive efficiency rating of 95.9 against Notre Dame and finished at 101.0 against Pitt.
“Juni not being out there, that’s a dynamic scorer as well,” Diebler said of Mobley. “Their pressure and physicality and extending some of our catches was a reason why. We want a little more up-tempo game and they didn’t. They executed their game plan really just a little bit better than we did.”
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementThornton finished with 18 points but needed 15 shots to get their in his most inefficient game of the season. Tilly missed seven of his eight shots. Royal led the Buckeyes with 22 points on 9-of-15 shooting but had a team-high four turnovers.
“They just pressured us, I guess,” Royal said. “Just wasn’t playing our best. It was really on us.”
Ohio State men's basketball beat writer Adam Jardy can be reached at [email protected], on Bluesky at @cdadamjardy.bsky.social or on Twitter at @AdamJardy.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: What happened to Ohio State down the stretch at Pitt? Takeaways
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