By 
We had a classic UFC tussle on Monday night, with Ohio State fighting “out of the red corner” and BYU fighting “out of the blue corner.”
If you love offense, that game was for you, as both teams cleared 80 points and the Cougars scored 60 during the second half.
The Buckeyes got a big game from sophomore forward Amare Bynum, who continued his great play from the preseason. Bynum scored a team-high 20 points and also had four assists, three rebounds, and two blocks in 35 minutes.
However, Bynum’s game was small potatoes compared to BYU’s Rob Wright, who scored 35 points on a super efficient 10-for-16 shooting.
It was not a career-high for Wright, as he scored 39 last season, but Ohio State had absolutely no answers for the junior guard who was (allegedly) considering transferring to Ohio State over the summer while he entertained pitches from coaches in the transfer portal.
Last week, Connor and Justin each predicted who would lead Ohio State in scoring in the BYU game.
Connor correctly picked Amare Bynum, who tied his career-high and recorded his second ever 20-point game. Justin went with Anthony Thompson, who winded up scoring just two points in his collegiate debut — both on free throws.
This week, the guys are analyzing that BYU game a bit more as we also prepare for game number two against Youngstown State.
This is less of a debate and more of an analysis — Connor and Justin are each going to list one positive the team can take away from that loss, as well as one thing that needs work.
This week’s prompt: List one positive and one negative takeaway from Ohio State’s loss to BYU
Connor:
Positive: Getting off to a strong start
If you didn’t watch the game on Monday night, you’d have no idea that Ohio State actually jumped out to a double-digit lead in the first half.
A Josh Ojianwuna layup with 9:23 left in the first half made it 22-11 Ohio State, and after BYU’s Tyler Betsey answered with a bucket of his own, Curtis Givens scored to push it back to an 11-point game, 24-13, with 8:32 remaining in the first half.
Ohio State shot better than 50% overall and from three-point range in the first half, went up by double digits at one point, and went into the locker room at halftime with a lead.
That lead did, in fact, crumble in the second half, but I’m focusing on the fact that it took them no time at all to start scoring points against BYU in the first half of the first game of the season.
Negative: The inability to defend without fouling
Something that absolutely needs to be cleaned up before Ohio State travels to Connecticut next week is how much they fouled in situations where they absolutely did not need to foul.
Fouling on made baskets? Check. Fouling 20 feet away from the basket when BYU is already in the bonus, thus giving the Cougars free throws they did nothing to earn? Check. Picking up senseless fouls when you’re one foul away from fouling out? Check.
The final foul tally was 23 for Ohio State and 19 for BYU, but Ohio State put BYU in the bonus with over 10 minutes left in the first half.
When Ohio State picked up their seventh team foul, BYU was still at two team fouls. John Mobley Jr. and Justin Pippen — Ohio State’s starting frontcourt, both fouled out on a night when BYU star guard Rob Wright scored 35 points.
Ohio State struggled staying in front of their man, especially in the second half. That created too many spots where the Buckeyes were chasing and then fouling because their guy got past them.
They’ll need to defend at a much higher level next week against UConn.
Justin:
Positive: The centers
One of the positives of the game to me was the center position.
It wasn’t perfect, and the defense was suspect at times, but the center position is a big question mark for the Buckeyes, and they combined for 22 points and 13 rebounds on 10-for-14 shooting from the field.
Kentucky transfer Andrija Jelavic got the start and led the way with 13 points and nine rebounds on 6-for-8 shooting from the field.
Again, the defense needs to be better, and Ivan Njegovan only played two minutes, but
Josh Ojianwuna will continue to get better as he gets more game minutes back from an injury, and Jelavic looked solid on offense.
Negative: Poor three-point shooting
The three-point shooting is something that is likely to be a big strength for Ohio State this season, but when that is a part of the offense, sometimes you can live and die by the three-pointer. In this one, they died by it.
Shooting 9-for-28, which is 32%, is not terrible in general, but five-star freshman Anthony Thompson finished 0-for-4, and Duquesne transfer Jimmie Williams finished 0-for-5 from long range. Both of those guys are going to be big contributors for Ohio State offensively this season, so they will need to hit their shots from deep.
The bench was 1-for-8 from three-point range, with Curtis Givens also going 0-for-2 and LJ Smith going 1-for-1. The bench production was some of the worst in college basketball last season, and Williams and Givens were brought in to help fix that.
Needless to say, they will need to hit more shots than zero moving forward.
https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/nuts-positive-negative-takeaways-ohio-183100784.html
