Bucks’ get Saints to start March madness
Right: Ohio State’s Evan Turner drives by Purdue’s Marcus Green in the Big Ten tournament championship on Sunday.
(Getty Images)
Earlier this evening it was announced that the eighth-seeded Ohio State Buckeyes will take on the ninth-seeded Siena Saints at the University of Dayton Arena in Dayton, Ohio, for a first round match-up in the NCAA Tournament on Friday. The tip-off time is approximately 9:40 p.m. ET.
Siena, which is located in Loudonville, New York, just a few miles north of the state capital of Albany, plays in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference and finished the season with an overall record of 26-7.
Out of the Saints’ 12 non-conference games, they won seven, though none of the teams are notable. Those victories include Boise State, Cornell, Albany, Buffalo, St. Joseph’s, Holy Cross, and Northern Iowa.
The five losses came at the hands of Tennessee, Wichita State, Oklahoma State, Pittsburgh and Kansas.
Siena’s last PRI ranking had them at No. 19, and their strength of schedule was at No. 66. So they’re definitely are not a cupcake.
Fran McCaffery, who’s in his fourth season as head coach of Siena, is 84-43 overall and took the Saints to the NCAA Tournament last year as a 13th-seed and advanced to the second round after they knocked off fourth-seeded Vanderbilt.
McCaffery has four players that average in double figures in scoring, led by 6-foot-3 senior guard Kenny Hasbrouck, who pours in 14.8 points per game. Edwin Ubiles, a 6-foot-6 swingman, averages 14.6 points per game, while 6-foot-5 forward Alex Franklin contributes 13.6 points per contest. Down low, 6-foot-9 sophomore forward Ryan Rossiter leads the team in rebounding, collecting 7.8 caroms per outing while averaging an even 10.0 points per ball game.
On Sunday, Ohio State had a golden opportunity to claim their second Big Ten tournament championship in three years, but let it slip away in the second half.
The Buckeyes took a 30-25 lead into halftime, but couldn’t get a defensive stop when they needed it most in the second period and had a hard time defending E’Twaun Moore, who scored 14 of his 17 points in the final stanza.
Moore did most of his damage from beyond the arc, nailing down 4-of-8 three-point attempts in the second half.
The Buckeyes led 40-37 with 13:15 left in the game, but Moore drained two triples on consecutive possessions before Marcus Green scored on a layup and Moore added another trey and all of a sudden the Boilermakers were out in front 48-41 with 10:45 remaining.
Purdue led by as many as nine points on four different occasions before Ohio State clawed back into the game.
With under a minute to play, the Buckeyes trailed 58-55, but Keaton Grant’s three-pointer with 47 seconds left was the second-to-last nail in the coffin. After Evan Turner scored on a conventional three-point play with 16 seconds to go, Chris Kramer’s two free throws four ticks later sealed the deal.
Turner finished with 22 points and 10 rebounds, while Jon Diebler and William Buford each had 15 points apiece for the Buckeyes.
Ohio State was outrebounded once again, this time by a 51-35 margin, which enabled Purdue to take 13 more shots from the field. Overall, the Buckeyes were 22-of-51 (43.1%) from the floor, and 7-of-17 (41.2%) from three-point range. Purdue shot 34.4 percent (22-of-64) from the field, and shot 32.0 percent (8-of-25) from beyond the arc.
