OSU unravels in top-15 loss to Michigan women
Ohio State’s women’s basketball team kept neck and neck with Michigan for a half on Sunday afternoon. Then it unraveled.
A low-scoring third quarter doomed the Buckeyes as they were dealt a 75-66 defeat by the Wolverines at the Crisler Center, their second loss in three games, which further endangered their hopes
for a Big Ten regular-season championship.
Trailing by four points early in the second half, the Buckeyes fell farther behind as Michigan mounted a 10-0 run over a span of three minutes and kept ahead by a comfortable margin.
At several moments, forward Naz Hillman proved tough to contain. She led the Wolverines with 27 points, and toward the end of the mid-third quarter run showed her strength around the basket.
When guard Amy Dilk missed a driving layup, Hillman boxed out a pair of Ohio State players to grab the rebound and put a layup back in.
In the teams’ previous meeting last month, the junior forward from Cleveland scored a school-record 50 points before the Buckeyes ultimately prevailed in an 81-77 win. They tried a zone defense to limit Hillman in the rematch.
Ohio State, which slipped to 13-4 and 9-4 in the conference, was without a similarly strong showing from its frontcourt counterpart in Dorka Juhasz.
Along with 12 rebounds, Juhasz scored only one point, missing all eight shot attempts.
Juhasz had been averaging almost 16 points per game as the team’s secondleading scorer prior to Sunday’s tip-off.
Guard Jacy Sheldon led the team with 26 points, including making a career-high six three-point attempts, but only two other players finished in double-figures.
The Buckeyes shot 40.4 percent, and they were especially limited by 17 turnovers on the offensive end.
It was the first loss for Ohio State in the rivalry since 2019; the Buckeyes had won the three previous games.
Their latest meeting was a matchup of top-15 teams, as Michigan had risen to No. 11 in last week’s Associated Press poll, while the Buckeyes were ranked at No. 15.
Falling behind by as many as 19 points late in the third quarter and trailing by double-digits for most of the second half, the Buckeyes cut the margin as little as six points with 1:49 left.
A 9-0 run over a span of less than 90 seconds allowed them to trail only by a 67-61 margin before a basket by Hillman snapped the stretch.
Starting point guard Madison Greene was unavailable for the second consecutive game.
The Buckeyes held their only lead late in the second quarter with 2:33 left in the second quarter. Free throws from Kateri Poole put OSU ahead by a point.
It lasted 34 seconds before a basket by Hillman put Michigan ahead for good. jkaufman@dispatch.com @joeyrkaufman