Tobacco Road Report

By Michael

If there was any doubt about whether OSU (6-1) was deserving of its No. 1 status, Wednesday’s game versus No. 6 UNC (5-1) should silence most of the doubters. The Buckeyes put on the most impressive first half performance seen in years before running out of steam against a deeper North Carolina team on the road 98-89.

Both teams came out in their standard pressure man-to-man defenses and looked for early offense as much as possible. Ohio State’s freshman point guard Mike Conley Jr. (8 points, 8 assists), who might just be the fastest man alive with the dribble, sliced through the Carolina defense and found his fellow Buckeyes for several opening three point shots. We were early fans of Conley and his ability to run the offense in our scouting report of the Buckeyes.

Conley found Othello Hunter (6 points) for an early dunk and then later assisted Daequan Cook (14 points, 9 rebounds, 2-5 3-FG) on a three point shot to give Ohio State an early 19-13 lead with 14:16 left before half. The Buckeyes were absolutely on fire, hitting four three pointers in the first four minutes. If it's possible, it felt like Ron Lewis had more than the 30 points he's credited with. He was 11-16 from the field and 2-4 from behind the arc.

No sooner than I had started writing, “UNC is forgetting about Tyler Hansbrough...”, Hansbrough (21 points, 14 rebounds, 2 blocks) freed himself inside for an easy two point bucket, slicing OSU’s lead to 22-17 at the 13:10 mark. Hansbrough didn’t have a great first half, but was active on the boards and provided needed energy. He finished with a career high 14 rebounds, erasing the demons he carried from the Gonzaga game a week earlier.

With about 6 minutes remaining before halftime, OSU’s frontline started getting into foul trouble. When Matt Terwilliger picked up his second foul with the Buckeyes ahead 35-28, OSU decided to drop into a 2-3 zone to protect the remaining Buckeyes from additional foul trouble. When Conley Jr. picked up his second foul with 3:41 left in the half, the Buckeyes found themselves with four players sitting on two fouls apiece: Conley, Harris, Hunter, and Terwilliger.

Once the Buckeyes went to the zone, the Tar Heels began to take control of the game. Back-to-back three pointers by Bobby Frasor (6 points, 3 assists in 18 minutes), followed by Danny Green (3 points, 2 rebounds, 2 assists in 11 minutes) assisting both Hansbrough and Ginyard (8 points, 8 rebounds) for easy buckets cut the Buckeye lead to 43-40. Frasor returned the favor by assisting Green for a dunk, cutting the Tar Heel deficit to one. The Tar Heels would go into the locker room only down 48-44, despite the Buckeyes hitting on 8-13 three point shots in the first half.

At halftime, TRR wrote the following in his notebook:

• UNC has taken the hit—OSU is 8-13 from three—and is only down four. OSU is getting into foul trouble and can’t play any better (sans Oden) in the second half.

• If I’m UNC, I keep the tempo high and apply more defensive pressure. With Hansbrough active and a rested Wright, UNC should continue to punish the OSU frontline.

• On defense, UNC needs to stay at home when Conley drives and guard the three point line. There’s no mid-range game tonight and the defense needs to take something away. Try making Conley score first rather than pass first. (See this link for explanation of the missing mid-range game today in college basketball).

As I’m busily writing all this down, the Official Wife of TRR sees Vitale and says, “He’s like a Muppet or something.” I have a frantic vision of Grover doing play-by-play in the second half. Sorry, Dickie V, I’ll never look at you quite the same way.

Ohio State came out of the lockers flat, as if thinking, “You mean there’s another 20 minutes to play? All our previous competition lied down by now.” Hansbrough blocked Conley and scored two quick buckets on the inside. Before OSU could recover, Ellington knocked down back-to-back three pointers and Carolina found itself on a 12-2 run to start the second half.

Then I saw OSU start to do something strange. They began using a high pick and roll for Conley with one of their bigs at the top of the key. This was strange for me to see since Conley had zero trouble getting anywhere he wanted in the first half. Although the screen was effective in getting Conley some initial good looks, the Tar Heels quickly adjusted. For the rest of the game, Conley found a seven-footer riding saddle on him off the top of the high screen. The double team made Conley’s job a bit harder and OSU didn’t get as many clean looks from three. Did any other readers notice this, too, or is TRR seeing things?

Carolina continued pounding the ball into Hansbrough and Wright (11 points, 5 rebounds) and slowly wore the Buckeyes down. Credit Wright, and a history of team-orientation at UNC, for not jacking up a bunch of shots in the second half in a futile attempt to reach his 17 ppg average. He was focused and played his role for the Heels. Kudos, big man.

With about four minutes to go, and Carolina up 84-72, the Tar Heels were content with trading layups for foul shots and really shut down the three point line. Drives to the basket by Conley were largely left unchecked and Carolina made enough of their free throws to stay comfortably ahead the rest of the game. Carolina’s depth came through in this game and excellent minutes by Frasor, Green, and Ginyard at the end of the first half were key.

Final game note: In our sure-fire prediction for this game, we had the under/over on Dickie V saying “diaper dandy” at 60. The good news is that it took him :02 to say it once, but the bad news is that it’s the only time I counted him saying it. So all you “unders” out there won by a mile.