When’s the last time Ohio State started four freshmen?

On Feb 21, 2023

Sunday’s game at Purdue wasn’t just the first time Ohio State started four freshmen. It was the first time in any of their lives that Ohio State had started four freshmen in a men’s basketball game.

When first-year center Felix Okpara won the opening tip against Purdue’s Zach Edey, he did so with classmates Roddy Gayle Jr., Brice Sensabaugh and Bruce Thornton all on the court with him at Mackey Arena in what would become an 82-55 loss. It marked the first time in nearly 30 years that the Buckeyes had opened a game with four freshmen on the court together.

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When was the last time Ohio State opened with four freshmen?

The last time Ohio State did that, Jason Singleton, Shaun Stonerook, Damon Stringer and Jermaine Tate were in the starting lineup at Penn State to close the 1995-96 season.

Immediately after the loss to Purdue, coach Chris Holtmann was asked about having started four freshmen on the road against the No. 3 team in the nation.

“I have a lot of thoughts on that, but those guys have competed all year and played a lot of minutes at this point,” Holtmann said. “It’s a tough thing for those guys to do on the road, a top 3 team in the country. That’s a tough thing for those guys, but they helped our start be really good. Minus some foul trouble I thought those guys did some good things.”

The 1995-96 Buckeyes lost their season finale to the No. 16 Nittany Lions, 86-70, to finish the season 10-17 overall and 3-15 in the Big Ten. These Buckeyes are now 11-16 overall, 3-13 in the Big Ten and sporting and eight-game losing streak entering a Thursday home game with Penn State.

Ohio State went to Purdue with its freshmen having played the highest percentage of minutes among any Big Ten team this season. Against the Boilermakers, those four combined to log 93:33 of playing time and score 54.5% (30 of 55) of Ohio State’s points. Sensabaugh led the team with 20 points and five rebounds while Okpara had 4 points and two rebounds and Gayle and Thornton each had 3 points and zero rebounds. Thornton had three steals.