Behind Roddy Gayle's career night, Ohio State outlasts West Virginia in overtime
CLEVELAND – Any number of the fans inside Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse on Saturday night were there courtesy of holiday gifts. A tripleheader dubbed the "Legends of Basketball Showcase" that featured a nightcap between Ohio State and West Virginia promised a hoops-filled day inside the home of the NBA's Cavaliers.
Ohio State gifted them some free basketball. In their first overtime game of the season, the Buckeyes (11-2) missed a shot to win at the end of regulation but never trailed in the five-minute extra period and took down West Virginia (5-8), 78-75, in a thriller powered throughout by a career game from Roddy Gayle Jr.
"It’s extra basketball," Ohio State's Jamison Battle said. "It’s five extra minutes. It’s understanding that mistakes are in the past and we’ve got to go out here and play this five minutes. You can’t look back on what happened because you can’t change that. In that next five minutes, how can I impact winning?
"That’s the question we all asked ourselves and we answered it. We rang the bell today."
Gayle scored a career-high 32 points to lead all scorers on a night where offense was occasionally hard to come by, and every one of them was needed.
Jamison Battle opened overtime with a 3-pointer, making him 5 for 11 from deep, and two possessions later Gayle hit his third 3-pointer as the Ohio State offense started to click. The Buckeyes scored on six of their first seven possessions in overtime with the lone miss a point-blank attempt by Evan Mahaffey to build a big enough lead to hold on. Battle, Gayle and Bruce Thornton all hit 3s during that stretch.
Gayle's 32 points came on 11-for-21 shooting. He also pulled down seven rebounds and dished out six assists in 37:55.
"It would be selfish of me to take all the (credit) personally," Gayle said. "I want to thank my teammates for giving me that confidence and looking for me, especially Jamison finding me on open looks.
"A guy that you may never know impacted the game as much as he did was Evan. I want to give Evan his props. He battled down there on the boards. Big thanks to Evan. He saved a lot of my mistakes."
The win is Ohio State's first in overtime since it beat Indiana 80-69 at home on Feb. 21, 2021.
The Buckeyes led 78-73 with 1:15 left but missed their final five free throws and turned it over before emerging with the three-point win.
"Our guys stepped up and made a lot of plays down the stretch -- outside of the five missed free throws," Ohio State coach Chris Holtmann said. "I’m proud of them for that."
Ohio State hadn’t trailed since it was 3-0 in the opening minutes, pushed its lead as high as 14 points during the first half and led 58-49 with 6:59 to play. West Virginia, powered single-handedly at times by Noah Farrakhan, just kept coming.
A RaeQuan Battle deep 3-pointer with 2:47 left got West Virginia within two points for the third time during the second half, making it 63-61. Patrick Suemnick again got West Virginia within two points at 65-63 on a putback with 1:14 left, and when Jamison Battle missed a 3-pointer on the next possession the Mountaineers retained possession after video review with 42 seconds left on the clock.
Farrakhan then drove, drew Ohio State's defenders and found Suemnick for a layup with 29 seconds left to knot the game at 65. That gave the Buckeyes a final possession, and they called timeout with 18.3 seconds left, 18 seconds on the shot clock and a chance for the win. With the seconds ticking off, Gayle was pressured into a contested, fadeaway jumper from the right baseline that didn’t fall, sending the game into overtime.
"We tried to get in our set but West Virginia was denying Bruce (Thornton)’s catch," Gayle said. "We wanted the ball in Bruce’s hands and run a play similar to what was giving us success in the second half but they played it perfectly. They denied Bruce’s catch and then we were all in sort of a scramble. Then they matched up at the last minute, which kind of threw us off a little. We got a shot on rim and that’s all we can hope for."
The guard also had seven rebounds and six assists. Ohio State's Battle had 17 points and eight rebounds. West Virginia's Battle had 24 points and 10 rebounds.
Ohio State has won 11 games before January for the first time since it was 11-2 during the 2019-20 season. The Buckeyes beat West Virginia for the first time since a 77-68 win in Columbus on Nov. 28, 1995, snapping a five-game losing streak at the hands of the Mountaineers.
The win also moves the Buckeyes to 7-4 all-time when playing in Cleveland.
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It looked to be a laugher early when Gayle Jr. drove, stopped, spun and finished a jumper from the free-throw line with 7:59 remaining in the half to give Ohio State its largest lead at 24-10. Along the way, the Buckeyes held the Mountaineers to five points, three of which were from the line, in the span of 8:15.
Quinn Slazinski broke that spell with a three-point play after drawing a foul on Mahaffey on the left block, leaning into him for the finish with 7:42 left. He hit the free throw after the media timeout, and as the Buckeyes brought the ball up the court the Mountaineers threw a zone defense at them.
It was quite effective. Ohio State would not score again until Zed Key had his headband knocked off by Josiah Harris under the rim, earning two free throws he hit with 2:21 left in the half that gave his team a 26-21 lead. Seemingly powerless to do anything but fire up off-target 3-pointers, the Buckeyes would get one more field goal on a Thornton drive and finish from the left block with 36 seconds remaining.
That allowed the Buckeyes to take a 28-26 lead into the break after a Kerr Kriisa 3-pointer had tied the game on the previous possession. During the final 7:42 of the half, Ohio State missed 11 straight shots leading into the Thornton finish, missed the front end of a one-and-one and had one turnover. Seven of those 11 missed shots were 3-pointers, and the Buckeyes led by only two at the half despite having taken 12 more shots than the Mountaineers.
Ohio State finished 2 for 15 (13.3%) from deep during the first half but held a 27-19 rebounding advantage.
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Ohio State, Roddy Gayle outlast West Virginia in overtime
