Ohio State (16-8, 8-6) was able to come through in a must-win game against USC (18-7, 7-7) on Feb. 11 with an 89-82 win at the Schottenstein Center in front of 11,367 fans.
The Buckeyes had a bit of a slow start, but were able to recover and keep the game close long enough to pull away in the final minutes of the contest.
The Trojans took an early lead with the help of five points from Kam Woods to go up 7-2 just over two minutes into the game. They extended their advantage to as many as nine points multiple times over the next few minutes, but the Buckeyes came back with a 9-0 run that was capped by jump shot from sophomore guard Taison Chatman that tied the game up.
Ohio State took its first lead of the game at 9:38 on a turnaround jumper from senior guard Bruce Thornton.
But USC took control of the game again and got back out to a five-point lead, 36-31, on two free throws. Ohio State struggled to make a run at the end of the half and went into the locker room with a 43-40 deficit.
It was a rough half of basketball for the Buckeye defense, allowing the Trojans to make 51.9 percent of their shots in the first 20 minutes while OSU made just 42.4 percent. That was hurt by its 2-of-13 shooting performance (15.4 percent) from beyond the arc.
The Buckeyes fortunes didn’t get much better right away in the second frame, with sophomore guard John Mobley Jr. missing his fourth three-pointer of the game on their first possession. But senior center Christoph Tilly helped to start reversing that trend with a three-pointer of his own, bringing the score to a 47-45 USC lead with 18:03 remaining.
Ohio State took another lead on two free throws from Tilly nearly four minutes later to go up by two points and extended it to its biggest advantage of the game at 13:39 on a deep ball from senior forward Puff Johnson, who returned against the Trojans after missing two games due to injury.
The Trojans were able to hang around for the middle of the second half, going down by as many as seven points but using small spurts to bring the game closer.
At 5:49, Jordan Marsh of USC made a second-chance three-pointer to cut the OSU lead to 70-69, but the Buckeyes subsequently went on an eight-point run to lead by nine points.
But the Trojans didn’t make it easy for the Buckeyes to pull away with the win. They made it a one-point game again with just 1:09 remaining in the contest on a three-pointer from Alijah Arenas, but Thornton followed immediately after with an and-one layup and converted the free throw.
The Buckeyes were helped in the final minute when Arenas drove to the paint and attempted a behind-the-back pass to his teammate in the corner, but it was cut off by junior forward Devin Royal with just 13 seconds left in the game. Thornton made two free throws with five seconds left to seal the seven-point victory.
Thornton led the Buckeyes with 21 points on 5-of-11 shooting, going a perfect 11 of 11 from the charity stripe. He was followed closely by Royal, who had 19 points on 8 of 11 from the field with his only misses coming from deep. Also in double digits were Mobley (13) and freshman forward Amare Bynum (11).
Arenas led the Trojans with 25 points on 6-of-19 shooting with much of his production also coming at the free throw line, where he made 12 of 16 tries.
