Buckeyes fly past Dayton, 74-63
The Bucks took the floor in Value City Arena — against Gabby and I’s better wishes for an encore in St John — to a Regional Final type atmosphere in the quarterfinal matchup. At least one third of the sell-out crowd were comprised of Dayton fans, who made the trip from an hour out to root on the Flyers. And even though the Schott just doesn’t rock like St John, it certainly was electric. Therein, the mixed, but still amped, crowd saw the Flyers take the early momentum, as the Flyers were bound not to make the same mistake the Bears did, namely on the glass. The Flyers quickly neutralized Hunter’s presence on the boards, who finished with 5pts, 4rebs and 4fouls. The Flyers outworked the Buckeyes for a 20-12 first half rebounding advantage (8-2 in offensive boards) to compensate for 39% shooting. Senior guard Brian Roberts and freshman Chris Wright were every bit as good as advertised, carrying the Buckeyes to a 5pt advantage in the first half, which the Buckeyes whittled down to a 1pt deficit at intermission.
The Flyers, however, were not able to avoid the other pitfall for California: avoiding the Buckeye blitz out the intermission gates. The Buckeyes quickly took a 3pt advantage off of 4 quick points by a determined Evan Turner, who finished with 11pts, 3asts and 8rebs. Koufos would chip in 4 points to follow, finishing with 21pts, off of 9-11 shooting to go with 5rebs. Momentum really turned in the Buckeyes favour with a Jon Diebler 3pter — finishing with 10pts off of 3/5 shooting — to pad the Dayton deficit to 5. A Butler layup padded the margin to 7 with 6 and half transpired in the second half, behooving a Dayton timeout. Butler would finish with 12pts and 7asts. The Buckeyes would come out of the timeout and add more 3pters by Butler and Diebler again to pad the Buckeye lead to 12 with 10 minutes left. The Buckeyes would finish 53% from the floor for the game, compared to the 40% for the Flyers.
Defense would lead the way for the Buckeyes as well, where the Buckeye press and stiff defense from Turner and Lighty forced transition baskets. Underscoring how stifling the Buckeye defense was is the 16 Flyers turnovers to 7 Buckeye turnovers, when Danny Peters and Kyle Madsen’s garbage time turnovers are factored out. The Buckeyes would extend their lead to 15pts with 5 minutes left, and as high as 18pts with 3 and change left before garbage time basketball pared it down to the 11pt edge at the final gun. The routing of the Flyers in the second half allowed for extended applause for senior guard Jamar Butler as he left the floor with a minute left to play.
The Buckeyes will play Ole Miss in Madison Square Garden on Tuesday, who beat Va Tech convincingly earlier in the day in Blacksburg. The Buckeyes are 3-0 in NIT games attended by our own Max Power, who will presumably not make the trip to New York. Hopefully he can send a little mojo their way.
going small to begin the second half was a great adjustment by Matta that paid almost immediate dividends. Who knew the Bucks could do that to Dayton with Hunter riding the pine for most of the half?