On the eve of their first game of the Big Ten Tournament at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis on Friday at 9 p.m. against Iowa, Ohio State head coach Kevin McGuff, senior guard Taylor Thierry and graduate forward Ajae Petty didn’t know who their first-round opponent would be but still felt prepared for the next stage of the season.
“I think we’re pretty motivated,” Thierry said during a media availability on Thursday at the Schottenstein Center. “We have a lot of momentum going into these next couple of games, I think we’re ready to really compete.”
The Buckeyes’ momentum heading into the postseason comes despite a 93-90 overtime loss to Maryland on Sunday, when McGuff’s squad was defeated on a last-second three-point shot.
Still, Ohio State had previously picked up two convincing wins over Purdue and Michigan State respectively in late February and even though the team didn’t get the result it wanted against Maryland, they are focused on using the loss to improve.
“Sometimes when you go through adversity, you don’t always want to go through that,” Petty said. “Of course, we wanted to come out with the win, but a lot of the times when you lose it exposes a lot of different things that we need to get better on.”
Eventually, the Buckeyes’ opponent became clear when Iowa defeated Michigan State 74-61. Despite the uncertainty of the opponent, the Buckeyes had a general idea of what they were going to face in the quarterfinals of the Big Ten tournament.
“We kind of thought it would be Michigan State versus Iowa (Thursday night), and so we kind of took some common themes of what they do,” McGuff said. “We’ve played both of them fairly late in the season, so we’ll prepare a little bit for both of them.”
As McGuff pointed out, the Hawkeyes — who come into their matchup with a pair of Big Ten tournament wins under their belt, including an 81-54 first-round win over Wisconsin on Wednesday — are a familiar foe to Ohio State. The Buckeyes and Hawkeyes matched up in a regular season battle on Feb. 17, a game in which Ohio State gave away a 12-point lead with only 1:38 to go in regulation before beating Iowa 86-78 in overtime. Iowa star guard Lucy Olsen nearly pulled off the improbable win, scoring 27 points while dishing out seven assists.
McGuff attributes the Hawkeyes’ comeback to plays made by Olsen in addition to the Buckeyes’ defensive shortcomings.
“I thought we played well for the most part and had the game under control and didn’t close it out the way I thought we could have, especially on the defensive end,” McGuff said of the regular season game between the two teams. “And to their credit, Lucy Olsen made some great shots. She was really, really good in that game, and very good late in the game to send it to overtime. If we get in that situation again, we would clearly have to defend her better.”
The close nature of the February matchup between Ohio State and Iowa is nothing new. In fact, in 2024, the Buckeyes also needed overtime to defeat a Caitlin Clark-led Iowa team 100-92 in overtime. Less than two months later it was the Hawkeyes, who came out on top 93-83 in a high-scoring affair in the Buckeyes’ regular season finale. It isn’t just the fact that the Buckeyes and Hawkeyes seem to play close games that contribute to what Thierry describes as a rivalry, but also a level of physicality the game is played with.
“Obviously, looking at the past games that we’ve had against them, I feel like it’s always been a chippy game, pretty physical game,” said Thierry. “I feel like there’s been a little bit of disrespect on their end. So I think that we just use that as motivators and just be out there ready to compete.”
