While nearly every stat line and odd points in the Buckeyes’ favor in Saturday’s first-round NCAA Tournament matchup with Howard, the beauty of March basketball is that anything can happen.
Here are three things to know heading into Saturday’s matchup, whether you’re rooting for the favored Buckeyes, the underdog upset, or just a really great game of basketball.
The Jaloni Cambridge factor
The sophomore guard is, in many ways, the key to Ohio State’s offense, but the game against Howard will prove a worthwhile test of her resilience.
In the Buckeyes’ last outing, a 72-62 loss to UCLA in the Big Ten Tournament,
Cambridge, who is the nation’s sixth-best scorer, struggled to find opportunities against the Bruins as her opponent found ways to contain her, consistently taking away her open lane. It is perhaps a testament to just how big of a threat she poses to opposing defenses that UCLA felt she singlehanded required that much defensive energy, but it was nonetheless difficult to watch.
It was just one uncharacteristically frustrating game for Cambridge, and now, the Big Ten’s leading scorer will have her chance to respond.
Cambridge, who is averaging 22.8 points, 5.6 rebounds and 4.6 assists per game, doesn’t rattle easily. The loss prior to that against the Bruins was a heartbreaking 88-86 overtime loss at home to their rivals from Ann Arbor. In her next outing, against No. 15 Michigan State on the road, Cambridge came out swinging, putting up 33 points against the Spartans to tie her season-high.
Howard presents another opportunity for Cambridge to hit that reset button and establish her dominance on the court.
While secondary scoring will play a role, especially as Howard will almost certainly double-team Cambridge to force the ball out of her hands, it’s unclear just how effectively the Bison will be able to do so. They don’t come into the game with the same defensive firepower as the Bruins, but Chance Gray, Ohio State’s second-highest scorer, can’t just be ignored either. Gray is averaging 14.9 points per game for her part.
If the Bison do manage to interrupt Cambridge’s rhythm the way the Bruins did, Gray is more than capable of stepping up to hit shots. In some ways, this too is a testament to Cambridge, that she is able to draw opponents off her teammates to create opportunities for them as well.
But at least on paper, Cambridge looks well-positioned to put up big numbers of her own once again, proving she’s able to bounce back as a leader of this team. If she’s able to find a shooting rhythm or hit her assists, she’s back and the Buckeyes have a clear path to victory (and quite possibly a dominant one).
Turnovers could turn the tides
On a tactical level, turnovers are likely to be one of the biggest factors in determining Saturday’s outcome. The Buckeyes are forcing an average of more than 20 turnovers per game (21.4, to be exact), making them a top-20 team in the nation at forcing opponents to turn the ball over.
Redshirt junior guard Kennedy Cambridge (Jaloni’s older sister) ranks top 5 in the country in recorded steals (3.9 per game), while sophomore guard Ava Watson and Jaloni Cambridge both rank top 10 in the Big Ten in steals with an average of 1.9 per game.
The Buckeyes are also capitalizing on these turnovers, converting them into an average of 24.4 points per game.
On their side, Howard is turning the ball over, on average, 15 times per game, while they are forcing an average of 18.7 opponent turnovers per game. The Bison have converted turnovers into an average of 18.2 points per game.
If the Bison can keep the turnover margin tight, it could help them keep things respectable on Saturday, but if they give the Buckeyes the opportunity to force turnovers effectively, it could lead to some big OSU runs, upending any Bison momentum and allowing the Buckeyes to turn chaos into complete control of the game’s tempo and, ultimately, its outcome.
Howard’s path to an upset
Despite the fact that the Buckeyes have never lost in the first round of the tournament under head coach Kevin McGuff, there is always a path to an upset in March.
Multiple things would need to go wrong for the Buckeyes for Howard to truly have a shot in this game, but if the Bison were to pull off the upset against the home court darlings, it’s likely that senior forward Zennia Thomas would be in the driver’s seat. Thomas, the MEAC Player of the Year, is averaging 15.2 points and eight rebounds per game.
The Bison don’t have a ton of offensive firepower, averaging just 66.9 points per game (compared to the Buckeyes’ 81.7 points per game, which ranks OSU at 13th in college basketball). Ohio State’s center Elsa Lemmilä should make it difficult for them to get going, especially coming off an impressive Big Ten Tournament run that all but announced, “Don’t mess with Lemmilä.”
Still, oftentimes in March, upsets come down to the underdog shooting hot and the favored team going cold. If Thomas can find some efficiency early and avoid foul trouble, it could be the difference between a respectable game and a blowout.
With Thomas leading the way, the Bison would also need some help from guards Zoe Stewart and MEAC Rookie of the Year Ariella Henigan to create some shot variance, interrupt the Buckeyes’ rhythm, and control both the boards and the turnover game.
It’s a lot to ask against a Buckeye team that has something to prove coming out of the Big Ten Tournament. Then again, the Bison have something to prove in Columbus as well, and they’ve got MEAC Head Coach of the Year Ty Grace to help craft their plan to keep things close.
Is it likely? No. Is it possible? Anything’s possible in March.
The Buckeyes and Howard face off Saturday at 11:30 AM ET in Columbus.
