Unlike some Ohio State fans, Hawkeyes respect Buckeyes men’s basketball

IOWA CITY — If the Iowa men’s basketball team follows seeding positions for the Big Ten tournament, it loved Tuesday night.

The top four teams at the end of the regular season get byes all the way to the Friday quarterfinals of the conference tourney. In one fell swoop of three games Tuesday, three other challengers for a top-four finish took a step backward.

Illinois fell into a tie with Iowa for fourth place at 8-6 with a loss at Penn State. Rutgers (8-7) slipped out of a tie with the Hawkeyes with a home loss to Nebraska. Michigan (8-7) dropped below Iowa with a defeat at Wisconsin.

The three winners of those games were teams in 10th place or lower.

All that served as a warning for Iowa to take Ohio State seriously when the Hawkeyes host the Buckeyes in Carver-Hawkeye Arena Thursday night at 8. The Buckeyes are 3-11 in the conference, firmly in 13th place.

However, the alarm didn’t need to be set. The lone team Ohio State has beaten in its last 12 games is Iowa, 93-77 in Columbus on Jan. 21.

“They've got a lot of different guys that can score. They've got a lot of different guys that can post up.,” Iowa Coach Fran McCaffery said. “They compete defensively. They've got some 3-point shooters, and they've got some depth. A team that we have the utmost respect for.”

That respect doesn’t necessarily extend to the Ohio State campus. Many Buckeye fans are calling for the firing of coach Chris Holtmann, though that seems unlikely given the sixth-year OSU coach guided his team to NCAA tournaments in each season it’s been held since he got to Columbus.

They argue the Buckeyes are just 46-48 in Big Ten play since their 15-3 league record in Holtmann’s first season there.

Last July, Ohio State quarterback C.J. Stroud said he thought a team of football Buckeyes could beat the basketball team at its own game. Sunday, after OSU’s 62-41 home loss to Michigan State, Buckeye offensive lineman Dawand Jones tweeted “We still can.”

Ouch.

Such ridicule of Buckeyes basketball is nonexistent in Iowa City. Not when the Hawkeyes got thoroughly defeated by Ohio State the first time around.

Not when the Hawkeyes saw 14-point underdog Nebraska go into Rutgers Tuesday and topple the Scarlet Knights. Not when, on the same night, they saw Penn State win for the second time this season against Illinois.

Not when the most points they have allowed in a game was to Ohio State.

“I just didn’t think we were really focused,” Iowa wing Payton Sandfort said Tuesday about that loss.

“We’ve just got to bring a different level of intensity, just laser-focused on the defensive end. Ninety-three points can’t happen again.”

“We definitely want some revenge this time around,” Hawkeye guard Connor McCaffery said. “We did not play well the last time, plain and simple. So I think there will be some added motivation for sure.”

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