Road teams in Big Ten play moved to 0-13 this season with No. 3 Ohio State’s (9-1, 1-1) 84-71 loss to Minnesota (5-5, 1-1) Sunday night in Minneapolis.
The Buckeyes were outscored, out-muscled, and out-hustled in Williams Arena. The Ohio State defense was lacking and the offense’s care for the basketball couldn’t be found anywhere either.
The Buckeyes were led on the scoreboard by freshman point guard DJ Carton, who scored a career-high 19 points, but also added five turnovers.
Junior forward Kaleb Wesson scored 12 points on 4-of-13 shooting, but added six turnovers of his own.
The Gophers were led by guard Marcus Carr, who scored a game-high 35 points on 12-of-17 shooting. He also added seven assists in his 38 minutes of play.
The Buckeyes fell behind early in this one and were never able to get back to a position where the game was in doubt.
A three-pointer by DJ Carton six minutes into the game gave the Buckeyes a 12-11 lead. That basket was then followed by a jumper from classmate EJ Liddell.
The Buckeye lead evaporated two minutes later following a three-pointer from Alihan Demir, making it 16-14 Gophers with 11:09 to play.
The Minnesota lead fluctuated throughout the first half, but finally hit double digits following a Marcus Carr three-pointer to make it 36-25 with 1:10 to play in the half. The three by Carr was just the start for the hot-shooting Gopher guard.
Carr then started the second half just as he finished the first. A pull-up jumper at the outset built the lead back to 11 points. A little over a minute later, Carr drained a three on the break to make it an 11-point game once again.
Andre Wesson cut the lead down to 45-36 with a three-pointer, but Carr drove the lane for a layup to get back into a double-digit lead. A pair of free throws and a driving layup two minutes later grew the lead to 16 points at 53-37 with 13:36 to play.
Back-to-back three-point scores by CJ Walker and EJ Liddell got the lead down to 55-43, but Carr again answered with a pair of free throws.
The Gophers got the lead up to 67-49 following a fast-break layup from Carr with just over six minutes to play.
A pair of free throws from Liddell got the Buckeyes within nine points with 3:50 remaining, but Carr again denied Ohio State, scoring a layup and a free throw 20 seconds later.
Seemingly every basket the Buckeyes scored down the stretch was negated by Marcus Carr, who added a pair of layups and a three-pointer in the final three minutes of the game to end all hopes for Ohio State.
Minnesota shot 31-of-57 from the field (.544), which was much better than the Buckeyes’ 23-of-60 (.383) shooting.
The Gophers outrebounded the Buckeyes 40-28.
Ohio State next takes the court Tuesday at 7:00 pm at home against Southeast Missouri State.
Box Score
I’m not sure you know the definition of routed
From my perspective the Bucks did everything but put the ball in the basket. Go back and look at the number of “can’t miss” shots they missed. One of the old basketball truisms. Shooting makes up for a host of other errors. We got tripped up by the flip side, if you don’t shoot the rest of your game cn be perfect and you still lose.
As well, it’s hard to avoid the value of homer refs. They must know who’s cutting the pay check. Imaginary calls against Ohio State players, no calls against Minnesota players. It reminded me of a school I used to coach against where I’d tell my players going in, we need to win by 10 to tie.
They just missed too many open looks. It’s basketball. It happens.
Norman there was nothing wrong with the officiating. OSU is not a great team. When Wesson is not on the floor, I dont know how they score. Good rebounding teams will destroy them, like Minnesota.
When a team shoots 54% from the floor at home and a guy gets 35, odds are you will lose. It was going to happen sometime I guess. Get back on the rails Bucks!!
They go on the road and tackle NC in Chapel Hill, but can’t beat Minne? smh Coach Holtman is in for quite a ride this year.
Andrew, Wohford beat NC last night. They are not a good team.