The wait is over. Ohio State women’s basketball returns to the court Monday to start the 2026-27 season.
While a matchup against the University of Illinois Chicago is not the brightest beginning to the new campaign, and might not be too close after the first few minutes, it is a basketball game that counts.
Head coach Kevin McGuff’s team has 31 regular season games ahead of them. Before any basketball gets dribbled though, there are already storylines to watch as the four-month regular season gets underway.
Out of the Second Round
There are no guarantees that the Buckeyes will make the NCAA Tournament come March, but barring any spectacular collapse, there will likely be postseason basketball for Ohio State.
With that said, the Second Round of March Madness is not too popular with fans of the Scarlet and Gray.
It has been three consecutive seasons of the Buckeyes hosting NCAA Basketball, only to lose in the second game of the first weekend. While powerhouse names in college basketball like the Duke Blue Devils, Tennessee Volunteers and Notre Dame Fighting Irish are respectable defeats, not as the favorite with an apparent home court advantage.
Now, the normal athlete interview about a situation so far away from November elicits an expected theme or not thinking about that, focusing on the first game and doing all they can to make it that far in the first place. Not for Ohio State. It is the elephant in the room.
“Just like getting out the Schott, the biggest emphasis for me this year. The rest I don’t really care about. The individual goals, I will do whatever it takes to get us out the Schott,” guard Kennedy Cambridge told reporters.
Should the Buckeyes continue their upward trajectory that the young group of underclassmen showed last season, hosting a fifth season in a row is a low bar.
The Cambridge Sisters
For the third season in a row, guards Kennedy and Jaloni Cambridge chose Ohio State to continue their history of competing together. After this season, only a trip to the professionals for both players and a friendly general manager would bring the duo back.
That means the end of the season will come with more emotion for the pair of standout guards, but it also means a final season of watching two standout guards play basketball alongside one another.
The pair of Cambridges now hold program records on both sides of the ball. Jaloni Cambridge fulfilled the promise that came with being Ohio State highest ranked freshman recruit (No. 2 overall).
Kennedy Cambridge, whose transfer from the Kentucky Wildcats to the Buckeyes prior to the 23-24 season was a strong catalyst in securing Jaloni’s commitment, took time to get into the starting lineup but smashed the Scarlet and Gray’s single season steals record and had over 100 takeaways for only the second time in Ohio State’s history.
Between the two sisters, Ohio State has speed, agility and is a force on both sides of the ball. Jaloni Cambridge is a candidate for Big Ten Player of the Year and Kennedy Cambridge is up there for Defensive Player of the Year consideration.
“I don’t want to think about it right now,” Jaloni Cambridge said when asked to talk about their partnership coming to an end in the spring. “Once again, just opportunities I would never take for granted. Every day I get to wake up and just seeing her on the court makes me happy.
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You, the person reading this article – these are the good ole days.
Competing in the Big Ten
The prominent names in women’s college basketball coverage see Ohio State somewhere between the seventh and tenth best team in the Big Ten.
It has been almost six full seasons since the Buckeyes landed outside of the top four of the conference, even when the Big Ten added four more teams, Ohio State stayed near the top of the standings. In that season, McGuff’s side was not allowed to play any postseason basketball due to recruiting violation sanctions.
Since then, Ohio State’s defensive press and continued work through recruiting and transfers kept the team relevant. So, what has changed from last season’s No. 4 finish to this season?
Guard JuJu Watkins returned for the USC Trojans, which means the Los Angeles side is a favorite to win the conference. Head coach Lindsay Gottlieb’s program may run away the way the UCLA Bruins did last season, but that does not mean Ohio State cannot compete.
Ohio State brought back the Big Ten’s best blocker Elsa Lemmilä, best stealer Kennedy Cambridge and top scorer Jaloni Cambridge from last season. There is a question about who fills in for the graduation of guard Chance Gray’s offense and injuries are always a wild card, but it might not take long to see how the side adjusted.
In the non-conference slate are three top tier opponents. On Nov. 12 is a home game against the UConn Huskies. Then the Ole Miss Rebels come to Columbus six days later. In December, Ohio State travels to Texas to play the Texas Longhorns.
If the Buckeyes compete in those games, the Big Ten might be more competitive than the experts expect.
“I think we returned enough that we wanted to see where we measured up against some of the country’s best programs, and we’re going to get that opportunity,” McGuff told reporters.
Freshman Impact
McGuff added three players to the roster this offseason, but one name popped up again and again in the names of returning Buckeyes — forward Adriana Díaz.
Out of Spain, Díaz has never played a game of college basketball but that does not mean the 6-foot-1 big has not competed against tough competition.
Alongside two UCLA Bruins commits, Díaz played with the Spanish youth national team and won a gold medal in the U18 European Championship. In addition, playing professionally with Movistar Estudiantes.
Normally a bench player enters a game to contribute in one specific area of the court. Díaz is likely coming in as a substitute but when she does enter the Buckeyes get a big who can play inside and outside. When athletes join the program, the one thing that slows down their impact is getting McGuff’s system down.
The players who know it well are not worried about that with Díaz in the slightest.
“She’s [Díaz] actually adjusted very, very well with like little to no help,” Elsa Lemmilä told reporters. “Not that we haven’t helped her, but she’s adjusted completely fine. She’s got our offense immediately, our defense immediately. Like we barely have to coach her because she’s doing so well. So it’s been it’s been fun to watch her.”
Kennedy Cambridge went a step further and said that Díaz could be one of the best to come out of the program when it is all said and done.
If the praise received by Díaz teammates is anywhere close to what the Buckeyes see on the court, the conference is in for a surprise. Díaz, combined with a healthy Lemmilä and forward Kylee Kitts is a formidable rotation.
Ohio State on Offense
A look into the conversation around the Buckeyes is incomplete without more about the loss of Gray. Now, Gray did not break program marks in her two years in the program, but what the guard represented for Ohio State last year cannot be ignored.
Gray was the lone piece of consistent offense outside of Jaloni Cambridge and despite the ability of the Buckeye point guard Cambridge, Ohio State will not do any of its goals shared above without more of a team effort on offense.
Last season, Gray was the only member of the team, outside of Jaloni Cambridge, to average at least double-digit points per game. Cambridge scored 28.5% of the Buckeyes’ points last season. That scoring was not due to selfishness either because she also led the team with 4.4 assists per game.
Even so, that is an area of focus for the junior point guard.
“I want to have a lot of assists this year. That’s my goal,” said Cambridge. “The points still come and go. I’m not really concerned about that. You know, I step up when I need to step up.”
Guard Ava Watson is the likely fit into the starting lineup with Gray’s departure, which means the defense-first substitution needs to play a complete game to fill that void. Watson showed offensive ability as a freshman when she came into games for the main purpose of catching and shooting from beyond the arc.
Outside of the two previous seasons with Watson and Jaloni Cambridge together, the pair played together before high school for years. The two did see the court at the same time over two seasons in Columbus, but not much as No. 1 and No. 2 guards.
Elsewhere, Kennedy Cambridge worked on her offense in the offseason and also knows that the offense needs more from the star defender. Lemmilä played with Finland in the offseason and is healthy for the first time ever as a Buckeye.
If Kitts is healthy after a midseason shoulder injury last campaign, a knock that kept her out of the starting lineup for the remainder of the season, that double-double ability will grow in her second season playing college basketball.
There are reasons why any of the members of the 11-player roster could make a lasting impact on the court, but until the games are played they are theories. Some like Jaloni Cambridge are likelier to be true while others down the roster have more to prove, the games begin Monday.
The talk is finally over.
