This is the Big One
Indiana men’s basketball takes on Ohio State for senior night in the last and biggest game of the regular season, probably for both teams.
This will be the second meeting between Indiana and the Buckeyes this year, with the Hoosiers winning on the road in overtime, 77-76, in mid January. The two teams have had their ups and downs since that meeting and enter the game at 9-10 in conference play.
More on the stakes later, but in short, this is one of the biggest single games in recent memory for Indiana basketball.
Here are three things to know:
The Stakes
On the line this game are: Big Ten Tournament seeding, NCAA Tournament bids, and Indiana’s perfect record against non Quad One teams. Oh, and it’s senior night for a team that’s been starting four seniors, three from Indiana.
This is a big one! There’s really no other way to put it.
The Hoosiers are currently given a 30% chance of making the tournament by Bart Torvik, and directly behind Ohio State as an 11 seed, per Bracket Matrix. Winning against Ohio State and then one more game in the Big Ten Tournament would probably solidify Indiana as a tournament team, but it starts with the win over Ohio State.
How will Indiana respond to the moment? Hopefully well.
The Rotations
Indiana was without Malik Reneau the first time these teams met, forcing Woodson to adopt the smaller lineup that he’s been leaning on over the last five or six games that have saved the Hoosiers’ season.
With Reneau available, expect him to play, but probably not at the same time as Oumar Ballo. When Indiana beat Ohio State earlier, Woodson never played two bigs together, playing Langdon Hatton for just five minutes when Ballo needed rest.
Now that this small ball lineup has had more time together, some wins under its belt, look for Woodson to lean on his guys as much as possible against Ohio State. Aside from playing Reneau over Hatton – and probably for longer stretches – it may be the exact same group of seven guys Saturday.
Momentum (?)
Indiana was definitely riding high with its three game winning streak heading to Oregon earlier this week. While the Hoosiers lost, it wasn’t necessarily a Must-Win for Indiana, and the Hoosiers kept it close, unlike prior losses.
So was the loss a step back? That remains to be seen.
Indiana didn’t look noticeably worse against Oregon, but posted the lowest Bart Torvik game score since the home loss to UCLA. The Hoosiers didn’t need a perfect game to beat Ohio State before, but they definitely scored better from an analytic standpoint.
Then there’s Ohio State, a team that’s won two straight entering this matchup, but had suffered three consecutive losses before that in a way that put their postseason hopes at risk. One was a 70-49 loss to Northwestern in Columbus.
With how up and down these two teams have been, it feels like there’s a lot of ways this game could go tomorrow. Whichever team can avoid being the worst version of itself will probably walk away the winner.