It comes a little late this time (Thanksgiving vacations tend to take precidence over cupcake eating), but it doesn’t change the result as the Buckeyes laid a pasting on the visiting Red Flash from St. Francis 110-47.
After several previous games with luke-warm starts for the Bucks, Matta put the fear of god in his players and got a substantially better result. Jon Diebler put down 5 3-pointers in the first half, along with plentiful scoring by the rest of the team to put St. Francis away before they had even begun to play. The score at the half stood at 52-22, more than enough points for the Buckeyes for them to have not played at all in the second stanza and still won. Head Coach Don Friday put it perfectly:
“We got shellacked… I feel like I went through a 15-round street fight with an 18-wheeler.”
Those 18 wheelers sure don’t pull any punches either.
Evan Turner did not explode like we expected, scoring fewer than 10 points in the game, but he did secure 8 rebounds and hand out 5 assists in a solid performance. It was nice to see other players step up to the scoring role in the abscence of Turner, as Simmons put down a game leading 18, Diebler hit 17, Buford got 15 and Hill sank 10. Especially worthy of note is that Simmons continues to perform extremely well coming off the bench, which will be extremely important in future games – especially in the Big Ten – as the additional scoring threats on the bench will provide a momentum and rest advantage.
Worthy of individual mention is Dallas Lauderdale’s performance. He hit 11 points, grabbed 6 boards and continued to defend his “Swatterdale” nickname with a crushing 6 blocks. Honestly, we haven’t seen this sort of blocking ability since Greg Oden and it makes the Buckeyes very dangerous on the defensive side of the ball down low. I was admittedly worried about Lauderdale early in the season as he looked a little timid and was often out of position. I’m happy to say that Dallas is quickly curing my fears and making me feel very comfortable with this team down low.
I was also briefly concerned when Dallas fell on his right wrist while trying to keep a ball inbounds while on defense. The right wrist is the one he broke in the off-season and there have been some questions as to whether it was 100% healed. It looked very uncomfortable, but it was great to see him get up and shake it off. There are no more questions about how that wrist is doing now.
It was about time that the team turned it on defensively, particularly coming out of the gate. Matta has often stressed how defensive intensity creates offensive intensity and it really stood out today. This was the biggest spread for a Buckeyes team since 1991 – you know, when Randy Ayres was the coach – against Chicago State. It was also the highest points scored by the Buckeyes since 1995 against George Mason. Yes, that George Mason. They’ve come a long way, haven’t they?
The Buckeyes will face off against Florida State in the ACC-Big Ten challenge on Wednesday Night (December 2nd) at 9:30 PM. You can see the game on ESPN2.
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