Ohio State fights but falls in thriller at Iowa as road woes continue
IOWA CITY, Iowa – A floor-to-ceiling curtain bisected the lone tunnel leading to the court at Carver-Hawkeye Arena. On one side, the home team danced, clapping rhythmically and generally enjoying the final seconds before taking the floor.
And on the other side, within earshot but out of sight, the Ohio State players did the same. It was a moment of levity, a team that looked like it had nothing to lose after losing so much lately.
The breakthrough will have to wait. In a game with 10 lead changes that was tied 15 times, Iowa hit a few more shots, made its free throws late and handed Ohio State a 79-77 loss.
"This is probably as good as I’ve felt in terms of how we competed in a minute," Ohio State coach Chris Holtmann said. "I think there’s some things we can take from this, but if we don’t take them and move forward in practice then that’s going to be the frustrating thing."
In the final minute, Roddy Gayle Jr. pulled down a physical defensive rebound with 38.6 seconds left, giving the Buckeyes the ball with Iowa clinging to a 74-73 lead, only for Felix Okpara to be whistled for a double dribble on the next possession with 24 seconds left.
It denied Ohio State a chance to take the lead, and Patrick McCaffery's two free-throws with 21.2 seconds left pushed Iowa ahead, 76-73, as the teams would trade trips to the line as Iowa fouled to prevent a 3-point attempt. Dale Bonner set the final score when he hit one free throw with 4.5 seconds and intentionally missed the second.
The rebound caromed off the rim and Okpara appeared to get at least a hand on it, but the ball ended up out of bounds at about the same time as the final buzzer. The play was not reviewed, and the Hawkeyes celebrated the victory.
"I thought if it was going to be anything it was probably going to be a tip-in situation, potentially," Holtmann said. "I did ask them to give it a look and they were not hearing it."
Ohio State (13-9, 3-8 Big Ten) has now lost four straight and seven of its last eight games. The Buckeyes have now dropped 15 straight road games, a drought of 398 days. Iowa (13-9, 5-6) snapped a two-game home losing streak and moved to 1-2 in games decided by seven points or fewer.
The Buckeyes took a 54-51 lead with 11:45 to play with a 6-0 run, but the Hawkeyes countered with an 8-0 run to take a 59-54 lead with an Owen Freeman free throw with 9:17 left. Iowa would keep scoring, coming away with points on six straight possessions, but Ohio State started to match its hosts blow by blow.
A Bruce Thornton drive and finish with 4:07 left tied the game at 67, and after Iowa's Tony Perkins hit an open jumper in the paint on the next possession, Thornton drew a two-shot foul and took the game into the final media timeout with 3:30 left.
He hit them both, tying the game again and setting the stage for a tense finish.
"These past two days, the prep we had, the bite we had in practice, the talk we had in practice, the communication we had, it came full circle today but obviously it wasn’t enough," Jamison Battle, who led Ohio State with 17 points, said. "You learn from it and try to do the same thing but do it better. If we can do that, good things will happen."
Iowa took a four-point lead in a nip-and-tuck first half when a Patrick McCaffery jumper made it 27-23 with 6:09 to play, but freshman forward Devin Royal halved the deficit when he collected his own shot that had been blocked by Owen Freeman and scored in the paint. Iowa then threw the ball away on its next possession, and the Buckeyes got a stop when Royal walled up Ben Krikke on the left block and forced a miss. As Okpara blocked out Freeman on the glass, the seven-time Big Ten freshman of the week was whistled for his second foul of the half with 5:07 to play.
The Buckeyes took the lead on a Gayle Jr. three-point play courtesy of his offensive rebound and finish in a crowd of Hawkeyes, and Gayle screamed and flexed both his arms as the foul was whistled on Pryce Sandfort with 4:43 left. Gayle then fed Okpara for a lob behind the Iowa defense, and it was a 7-0 run to put the visitors ahead 30-27.
It also started a run of five straight possessions where Ohio State scored, but it couldn’t pull away as the Hawkeyes matched the Buckeyes and pulled even at 36 when Josh Dix hit a 3-pointer to cap a possession with two offensive rebounds. That came with 1:55 left in the half, but Ohio State would get stops on the final three possessions of the half – albeit with some controversy that riled up the home crowd.
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Okpara put the Buckeyes ahead 38-36 with 37 seconds left on a left-handed hook shot just before the shot clock buzzed, and when Okpara blocked Dix’s shot out of bound with 0.3 seconds left on the shot clock, the Hawkeyes drew up a baseline out of bounds play only to have Ohio State cut off their primary options. The result was a shot clock violation, giving Ohio State the ball with 3.3 seconds left.
The Buckeyes put the ball in Battle’s hands, but his downcourt pass to Evan Mahaffey sailed out of bounds, giving Iowa the ball back with 1.8 seconds. The Hawkeyes fired a similar pass the length of the court and got it to Sandfort on the right baseline, but he missed the jumper while being bumped. No foul was called, and three assistants corralled coach Fran McCaffery as he yelled at the officials while everyone made their way toward the locker rooms.
The halftime lead was Ohio State’s first on the road since a Jan. 6 loss at Indiana, when the Buckeyes led 38-37. Okpara, who was scoreless in Tuesday’s home loss to No. 14 Illinois, had 10 points at the break to lead Ohio State while Royal and Gayle each had 8.
Royal finished with 9 points in 17:21 and added three rebounds.
Ohio State was without freshman wing Scotty Middleton, who was wearing a walking boot on his right foot and watched from the bench in street clothes. His status for Tuesday's home game with Indiana is to be determined.
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Ohio State falls in thriller at Iowa as road woes continue
