Cotie McMahon scores 24 points in 82-57 Ohio State basketball win
Two days before Ohio State’s game against Albany, coach Kevin McGuff emphasized his team’s need to improve its half court defense, with the goal of his No. 3 Buckeyes being just as effective in the half court as they are in their full-court press.
The Great Danes put that goal to the test Friday, with a slow-paced offense that focuses heavily on taking possessions deep into the shot clock. Ohio State handled it well in the first quarter and slipped in the second quarter before pulling away in the second half to win 82-57 and improve to 11-0.
“I thought it was a really good game for us to play because they run really good half-court offense,” McGuff said. “They set good screens and they grind it out and force you to play for close to 30 seconds. We’re going to see people that do that. First quarter, pretty good. Second quarter, terrible. Second half, great. … Bottom line is, we have to stay more committed to being the best version of ourselves for close to 40 minutes.”
The Buckeyes led by nine after the first quarter, but in the second quarter, the Great Danes were much more effective offensively. Coupled with a challenging offensive period for the home team, Albany took the lead halfway through the quarter.
The lead didn’t last long, but the Buckeyes led by only three points at halftime — far below what was expected for the No. 3 team in the country against an opponent that was a No. 16 seed in last year’s NCAA Tournament.
It took until the 5:18 mark of the third quarter for Ohio State to stretch its lead back to double digits for the first time since late in the first quarter, on a 3-pointer from Madison Greene that was just the third three the Buckeyes had made to that point.
“I said at halftime, they’re more committed to running good offense than we are to stopping them. Until that changes, the game’s not going to go the way we want,” McGuff said. “Second half, we came out and had great energy in the press. I think that really kind of rattled them and wore on them. In the half court, we were getting through screens better, we were communicating better, we were just much more active.”
From there, Ohio State took full control of the game. The Buckeyes held the Great Danes to 26 points in the second half while scoring 48 themselves. Taylor Mikesell found her shooting stroke with 3-pointers on back to back possessions that helped stretch the lead after making just one of seven in the first half, and Cotie McMahon continued her strong start to her freshman year with a career-high 24 points.
This was the first game that both Mikesell and Rebeka Mikulasikova have had quiet nights offensively for Ohio State, by their standards, and it was McMahon who stepped in to fill that gap, particularly in the first half as she scored 17 of the Buckeyes’ 34 points.
“She’s so fast and aggressive up the court,” McGuff said. “What I really liked tonight is — early on, she was getting some charges and just not seeing what’s in front of her and how she can get by them. She’s starting to make that adjustment, so that was really good to see.”
Though it hasn’t bitten them in the win-loss column yet, the early-season trend of struggling to pull away from lower-tier opponents early in the game is becoming concerning for the Buckeyes. It’s a testament to Ohio State’s second-half abilities that they’ve pulled away in every game but one — Sunday’s six-point win over Michigan State — but they know it’s a trend they’ll need to clean up as the season goes on.
“We need to start playing better in the first half,” Greene said. “We need to get it from the jump and not let (McGuff) get mad at us for us to start playing like that. But I’m just glad that he doesn’t take it easy on us and he expects a lot of greatness out of us.”
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