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A pair of top notch teams stepped away from strong conference schedules to go toe-to-toe Saturday afternoon when UCLA headed to No. 20 Ohio State in the second half of the CBS Sports Classic held in Cleveland. This marked the first event held at the Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse since March 10th.
The Ohio State Buckeyes overcame a modest second half deficit to defeat the UCLA Bruins 77-70 at the Rocket Mortgage Field House in Cleveland. This improved the Buckeyes record to 6-1 and was a nice bounce back from their loss to Purdue earlier this week. The loss dropped the Bruins to 5-2 and ended their 5-game winning streak.
The Buckeyes led for most of the first half until a 7-point run by UCLA gave the Bruins their first lead of the game at 26-25 with a little over 6 minutes to go. The Buckeyes would then split a pair of free throws to even it up at 26. The half would continue to go back and forth until ending with the Buckeyes holding a 39-38 lead.
The biggest difference in the first half was the number of foul shots taken. The Bruins had 14 while the Buckeyes were held to 5. Other than that, most everything else was dead even as they second half approached.
At the 10-minute mark of the second half, UCLA grew their lead to 59-54, their biggest of the game. They were only 4 of 10 from beyond the arc at that point, but continued to do their damage from the line as they were 14 of 18 at that point. The Buckeyes were able to keep it razor close as they were 6 of 17 from beyond the arc as it was truly anyone’s game still.
With 8:25 left to play, the Buckeyes capped of a 6-1 run to tie the game at 60. They were spreading the ball out perfectly at that point, as Jallow, Key and Lidell all had 9. The Buckeyes were moving the ball around and appeared to have the momentum.
From there the Buckeyes continued their run and got red hot. Scoring 10 of the games next 15 points to build their lead to 70-65 at the five-minute mark. This time it was Washington Jr getting hot, and increasing his point total to 12 at that moment along with 3 boards and 3 dimes. From there the Buckeyes would hold on for the 77-70 victory.
UCLA was supposed to be face Kentucky on Saturday with Ohio State meeting North Carolina, but the schedule was adjusted this week since UCLA and Ohio State had COVID-19 protocols that better aligned with the rules and regulations.
Ohio State has been known for tenacious defense this season. The Buckeyes have held six of their seven opponents to 70 points or fewer. They did it again tonight when it counted, and it led to another victory.
Leading the Buckeyes tonight was their ability to spread the ball out and get everyone involved. On the night their leading scoring was Duane Washington Jr with 14 points, despite only going 4 of 12 from the field. He hit two from beyond the arc and picked up four from the line.
The Buckeyes got 11 from Zed Key, 10 from CJ Walker, and 9 each from Eugene Brown and EJ Lidell 9. CJ Walker also paced the Buckeyes with 4 big assists. They shot 8 of 22 from behind the three-point line while UCLA only 4 of 13 from deep.
Leading the Bruins was Cody Riley with 15 points and 5 boards. Johnny Juzang also had 13 points while Jalen Hill had 10. Tyger Campbell did his best to spread the ball around with 5 assists.
