The Buckeyes stood tall against the Hoyas

by user Leslie Monteiro

Last year in the second round of the tournament, the Georgetown Hoyas easily had their way with the Ohio State Buckeyes as they defeated them 70-52 last year. The Buckeyes could not keep up with Roy Hibbert. Their head coach, Thad Matta said next year that they will be better equipped to handle their big men. He was referring to his prized recruit, Greg Oden at the time.

Last night, those two teams met in a rematch from last year. This time, the stakes were higher as the winner was going to the championship game. Both teams had a good shot of not just getting to that game, but they had a good chance of winning the national championship.

The Buckeyes head coach looked good in his last year's prediction because his star came through by scoring all of his 13 points in the second half to lead the Buckeyes to defeat the Hoyas 67-60.

The coach should have mentioned last year how good his supporting cast was going to be with Oden.

It was Oden's supporting cast that made it possible for them to get it done. His supporting cast was much better than Hibbert's supporting cast.

They got the big shots when they needed it. Guys like Michael Conley Jr, Ron Lewis, Jamar Butler, and Ivan Harris were huge whether it was in the first half or in the second half.

They had to get it done with Oden being in foul trouble early. Oden had couple of quick fouls to start the game and he was not heard from again in the first half, which is why he scored zero points at that half.

It should have not been surprising to see this because they have been able to play well without Oden when he was out for an injury in the regular season and when he had foul problem in the tournament against the Tennessee Volunteers.

What really was the difference in this game was the Buckeyes defense.

They did a great job of pressing Georgetown all game long. Their press force the Hoyas to turn the ball over 14 times in this game.

Their defense also force Hibbert and Green into foul problems, which was why the both of them could not have that big of a impact in this game as they had throughout the tournament.

The Hoyas looked out of sync for most of this game. They were horrible for the first ten minutes of the game. It was remarkable that there were within striking distance in the first half.

They started the second half well. They took a lead at 34-33 and tied the game several times at the half.

It was tied at 44, but then the Buckeyes went on a 10-2 run to take the lead 54-46.

They never looked back after that.

In that run, the Buckeyes made the big shots when they had to while the Hoyas could not run their offense with Hibbert in foul trouble.

We can go analyze the Hoyas troubles. Their guard play and their big men were not up to par in this contest.

With that said, the Buckeyes deserve credit for playing a great game. They did what they had to do to win the game.

The impressive part about their win was about how they were able to weather the storm when the Georgetown made that run in the second half to get back into this game. Georgetown's opponents like North Carolina just seemed to roll over under pressure in the second half.

They really showed their toughness in this game.

This has to be tough for the Hoyas. There is no question that they feel that they should have played better. It is never a good time to play bad in the playoffs of any round.

They could have done better, but even if they did, the Buckeyes were not going to be denied.

They will be back in the Final Four soon enough. They got a great coach who knows how to recruit and win games. It is just not their time.

As for the Buckeyes, this was a very good win. They have been shaky in the playoffs, but last night was their best performance of all the playoff games.

Now, they have to deal with the daunting task of beating the Florida Gators, who demolished the UCLA Bruins last night, on Monday night for the right to be the national champion.

It will not be easy because the Gators got so many big men that could be a huge disadvantage for the Buckeyes. Georgetown may be the only team that had a legitimate chance to beat the defending national champions.

With that said, anything can happen on one night so they got a good shot of winning it all if everything goes right like last night.

After this win for them, anything is possible.