Happy Friday, and welcome to another thrilling, heart-stopping, jaw-dropping edition of “You’re Nuts,” where our basketball writers each pick a side of a basketball-related topic and defend their stances to the death.
While it’s not “back to basketball” week quite yet, we are now in “back to school” mode, with schools across central Ohio going back to class, and even Ohio State resuming classes next week on August. 25.
The Ohio State men’s basketball team will be back on campus on Sunday in time to
start classes on Tuesday, and official practices will begin later in September.
The big news bit from this week was the official release of Ohio State’s full non-conference schedule, which includes five games against high-major teams, but only one of those games is in Columbus. With schedules increasing to 32 games, the Buckeyes will play 12 non-conference games in addition to 20 Big Ten games.
Last week, Connor and Justin debated how many players on the Ohio State men’s basketball team will put up at least one 30-point game this season.
Connor said that a whopping four guys – John Mobley, Amare Bynum, Anthony Thompson, and Justin Pippen – will all do it at least once, with Mobley probably doing it multiple times. Justin said that it’ll just be Thompson and Mobley – and pointed to Mobley scoring 28 multiple
times last year as the reason the junior guard will definitely get there.
This week, we’re predicting how Ohio State will do in its dozen non-conference games. We don’t have tipoff times yet, but we know who Ohio State is playing, when, and where.
Last year, Ohio State played one ranked team (North Carolina) in the non-conference, losing 71-70, and split their four high-major non-con games, beating Notre Dame and West Virginia while losing to the Tar Heels and Pitt (again).
This week’s question: What will Ohio State’s record be in the non-conference?
Connor: 10-2
I think Ohio State is going to pick up a few marquee, resume-building wins in the non-conference, which is something they lacked last year.
The Buckeyes had to win big games in conference play in February and March to launch themselves into the NCAA Tournament. If they can win a few big ones before conference play starts, that’ll prop them up a bit and give them flexibility that they did not have last year.
Here’s how I see it going down:
BYU (WIN) – Ohio State has been pretty good in these early season games against high major teams, especially when they play them in the first week or two of the season.
Last year they beat Notre Dame on Nov. 16 in the fourth game of the season. Two seasons ago, they beat 19th-ranked Texas on Nov. 4 to open the season. In 2021, Ohio State beat Duke at home on Nov. 30.
BYU will probably be ranked to start the season, especially after adding former Michigan State big man Jaxon Kohler to the team on Thursday, but the Buckeyes have just been pretty good in these kinds of games the last decade or so.
Youngstown State (WIN) – You just have to beat Youngstown State at home.
Marshall (WIN) – Love a good Big Ten – Fun Belt battle.
UCONN (LOSS) – UCONN brings back their starting backcourt from a season ago, with Braylon Mullins and Silas Demary both returning. The Huskies have also lost a total of eight home games over the past five seasons — they just don’t lose at Gampel Pavilion often.
This will be one of the toughest regular season games Ohio State has dealt with in the past decade, and I don’t think they’ve got a great chance to pull this one off.
Prairie View A&M (WIN) – Just sign the check and win by 40.
UMBC (WIN) – The Retrievers were an NCAA Tournament team last year, but were still No. 187 in KenPom so let’s not let our imaginations run wild too much here.
Vanderbilt (LOSS) – Mark Byington is one of the great wizards of the transfer portal, turning over his roster at Vandy nearly every year but has really seemed to have hit a groove in Nashville.
Tyler Tanner coming back to school instead of being a late first round NBA Draft pick is massive — he might be the best player Ohio State faces all year long. This will be a tough one for Ohio State, although more winnable than UCONN on the road.
Lipscomb (WIN) – Back-to-back games against Nashville-based schools, but Ohio State wins this one.
Notre Dame (WIN) – Notre Dame is going to be a basement-scraping team in the ACC, but playing on the road will make it a bit tougher. I don’t think Notre Dame will be as talented as Pitt was last year, and everyone thinks that Pitt game was one that the Buckeyes should’ve had.
Stony Brook (WIN) – Head Coach Geno Ford is a former college teammate of former Ohio State assistant Jeff Boals. There’s your connection.
Kansas (WIN) – This is the biggest coin flip for me. Like last year, this Kansas roster may not be quite as elite the Kansas “standard” that I’ve gotten used to for the last decade or so.
This will be a true neutral site game, so it’ll be good on good, and the location will have nothing to do with it.
Mississippi Valley State (WIN) – The worst team in D-I.
Justin: 9-3
Even though I think they will finish the non-conference schedule 9-3 and head into conference play with three losses, I am not saying this because I think Ohio State will underperform. I think that one of the teams that Ohio State is playing in the non- conference will be better than some people think.
And that is BYU.
Let me start with the other two losses. I think the Buckeyes will lose to UConn (probably not a hot take) and lose to Vanderbilt (maybe a hot take).
UConn is simply a better team than Ohio State, and Vanderbilt has one of the best players in the country (Tyler Tanner) and an extremely underrated transfer portal class.
As for BYU, they just added Jaxon Kohler from Michigan State, and with the questions Ohio State has at center, that could be a problem for the first game of the season. They also have Rob Wright and Kentucky transfer Collin Chandler, who I think will really benefit from a change of scenery.
Also, I think Richie Saunders could still technically come back to school, but who knows in this day and age.
9-3 with a win over Kansas and Notre Dame won’t be the end of the world for the Buckeyes.
