No. 9 Ohio State women’s basketball is bound for the Pacific Northwest as the Big Ten side takes its second annual conference trip to the West Coast for two games. This time, against the No. 24 Washington Huskies and Oregon Ducks. It is a trip that features a ranked matchup, a return to Eugene, Oregon for former Ducks guard Chance Gray and a late nine o’clock Eastern Time tipoff on Thursday.
“I’ve actually learned that this year I need to bring some energy drinks because 8:30 is my bedtime, and when
we had those eight o’clock games here, I was like, dying,” guard Kennedy Cambridge told reporters. “My team was like, ‘It’s 10 o’clock Kennedy, how are you still awake?‘ I was like, I don’t know.”
There will be plenty of time to discuss the basketball matchups, the implications of the games’ results and more but there was one lesson that the Buckeyes took from their first trip out West. Last season, Ohio State traveled to Los Angeles for games against the UCLA Bruins and USC Trojans. This year it is Oregon and Washington. There is no word that this format will continue past this season as the Big Ten’s 18-game, play every other team at least once, setup was only guaranteed for the first two seasons of the merger.
This time around, there is a bit more traveling between the Thursday and Sunday games compared to last season where the two schools were about 12 miles apart. There is over 200 miles in-between Seattle, Washington and Eugene, Oregon.
While Ohio State’s one trip a season out West pales in comparison to the multiple trips made by the Bruins, Trojans, Ducks and Huskies, there are still learning lessons for a multi-game trip thousands of miles away. Albeit a surprising one.
“You’ve got to manage their time a little bit. There’s so much downtime, and so we may look at that and just maybe have some activities for them, but it’s gonna be a tough trip,” head coach Kevin McGuff told reporters. “It’s a long trip that we just have to find a way to stay locked in and focused for.”
Outside of extra caffeine, the players have ways of staying locked in and focused for all that extra time outside of practice, games and school work.
On the plane, members of the team like Imposter, a word game where one person is the “imposter” and that person tries to lie their way to convincing everyone they received a word. At the same time, the non-imposters all try to find who is lying, like the popular reality competition show “The Traitors,” but with less banishment. Freshman guard Dasha Biriuk especially loves Imposter, according to the Cambridge sisters.
“Our coaches are probably annoyed with us on the plane because we be loud,” Kennedy Cambridge said.
“Yeah, we’re in the back for a reason,” Jaloni Cambridge said.
The plane trip is one thing, but there is time away from the court where the Buckeyes will be in a hotel room. Point guard Jaloni Cambridge brought five new LEGO sets to build. The guard is known for her love of the popular building blocks and even with luggage and traveling, the sets come along. Cambridge brings extra suitcases and bubblewrap to bring them all back in one completed piece.
Not everyone is a LEGO connoisseur like Jaloni Cambridge and redshirt freshman center Ella Hobbs, but there are plenty of ways for folks to stay entertained.
“We already planned for this trip. Me [Kennedy Cambridge] and Chance [Gray] are both bringing our Nintendo Switches, and we have Uno,” Kennedy Cambridge said.
Ohio State players’ game of choice is Overcooked. For the uninitiated, Overcooked is a simple game where the player controls a chef who has to chop, boil and steam food as orders come into the kitchen. It is important to note that simple does not mean easy.
Land-Grant Holy Land played it for the first time to understand the mindset of the players, and because it was on sale in the Nintendo store. The game causes anxiety and wipes the brain of the player completely away in an attempt to dice lettuce and tomatoes while simultaneously look at the pile of dirty dishes that need cleaned to get the order out of the kitchen.
On top of that, the version of the game played for research purposes was Overcooked 2, which also featured explosions, fires, and wind that moves or blocks players from getting where they need to go.
Simply put, Overcooked is about as close as someone can get to playing in Ohio State’s havoc-inducing full court press without donning scarlet and gray. The Buckeyes’ affinity with the simple yet frustrating game is almost too on-brand.
Overcooked can be a single player or multiplayer experience. When alone, the player alternates control between two chefs. When more than one person gets into the game, via local connection or across the vast internet, players work together. Sometimes the levels’ setups require chefs to work together by throwing necessary ingredients to the other side of the kitchen where, conveniently, the only place to cook them is located.
Below is a video of the gameplay to get inside the madness.
Does that mean that Overcooked is a symbol of teamwork? A game used by the players to sharpen their skills and improve hand-eye coordination? Nope. After all, the game is competition and players do not get into a power conference school and compete against the best college basketball players in the country if they are not at least a little bit competitive. Kennedy Cambridge is more than a little bit competitive.
“Oh, I start saying bad words,” Kennedy Cambridge said. “Because if you if you not in your station, and you not doing your work, Nah, you gotta pass the controller.”
Then there is Mario Kart, a much less frustrating game until someone behind the player has a red turtle shell. That game requires no teamwork at all, just setting sights on an opponent and doing anything, and everything, to get past them.
This season Mario Kart has an added bonus for the Buckeyes, because now other people get a chance to win thanks to a former Ohio State athlete’s move out of the program and into the WNBA.
“Taylor Thierry has never lost at Mario Kart,” Kennedy Cambridge said. “We played it all the time. She never lost. Put that in an article.”
Yes, chef.
