COLUMBUS — Following Ohio State’s 75-61 loss to Maryland, Terrapins’ head coach Mark Turgeon spoke with reporters. He was followed by Ohio State players Duane Washington and CJ Jackson. Buckeye head coach Chris Holtmann was the final participant on the night, and he talked about the difficulties that his team is facing right now.
Mark Turgeon
+ They don’t take this win lightly. They have great respect for Chris Holtmann and his team. This is the best Maryland has played here in their five years in the Big Ten.
+ Ohio State missed some shots, but he’s happy with how well his team played and shot the ball.
+ Maryland is comfortable on the road. They handled OSU’s runs well. He was upset at the outset of the second half. The Terps scored well out of timeouts, which helped also.
+ Ohio State was ranked 14th in the country 10 days ago. They’re a good team, they just missed shots tonight. Teams go through that. They had some good looks and bunnies. It was a bizarre night and Maryland was fortunate.
+ Kaleb Wesson “is a load.” He was pushing Fernando Bruno around, who is also a load.
+ What concerned him about Ohio State is that they are extremely well coached and well coached defensively, and that always concerns you on the road. They can go big and small, and playing in Columbus is always a concern. “I’ve got a lot of respect for them and they’ve got good players. I was a nervous wreck all day and my guys really played well.”
+ He told his team not to listen to the media or look at their record because “this league’s too good.” They have to stay even-keeled.
CJ Jackson and Duane Washington
+ Jackson said OSU was going through the motions defensively. When you do that, you give the opponent good looks at easy shots.
+ Jackson: “We missed a couple of easy ones, including myself.” They didn’t get the ball into the paint as much as they should have either.
+ Washington said they worked on ball movement this week in practice. Giving up a good shot for a great shot and using the 30 seconds as best as they could.
+ Jackson: “That’s the biggest thing, we’re just shooting ourselves in the foot. That’s what’s frustrating.”
+ Washington said he’s confident in everyone’s shooting, but unfortunately the shots weren’t falling.
+ Jackson: “I don’t think confidence should be an issue with anybody. We’ve been playing basketball forever.”
+ Washington: “I’m always confident whether I’m 0-10 or 10-10.”
Chris Holtmann
+ “Give Maryland credit. I thought they played well. Obviously shot it well.”
+ Maryland got some threes off of OSU trapping Bruno and they made some shots. The trapping was done to try to keep OSU out of foul trouble.
+ OSU will stay the course right now and the coaches will work hard to try to put the guys in better position.
+ Asked how to get the shots to start falling and how to get out of this funk, Holtmann said you try to judge the quality of the threes. They took some quick ones tonight, but Maryland was really collapsing on Kaleb Wesson, so the looks were there.
+ “The book’s out on how to guard us.” Teams collapse on Kaleb and let OSU shoot from the perimeter.
+ Maryland made it difficult to get the ball inside, then collapsed well when they were able to get it inside.
+ “My biggest frustration tonight was our lack of activity defensively.” Second was stretches where they didn’t take great shots.
+ They just haven’t had enough consistency shooting to open up the offense. Teams collapse on Kaleb and the shooters can’t make defenses pay.
+ Holtmann is hitting on some of the same messages more than once during practices with his team.
+ This team isn’t getting to the free throw line nearly enough. They expected that, but it still has to get better. It was good to see Duane Washington be aggressive in the paint.
+ This is a challenge that isn’t for the feint of heart or weak-minded people. “We’ve got to all accept responsibility.”
+ On CJ Jackson: “I thought he was okay. I think he did some good things.” He was the most active perimeter player. A couple of his turnovers were frustrating.