Ohio State needs Jae’Sean Tate to get back to being Jae’Sean Tate. The Buckeyes’ sophomore forward and de-facto team captain has not been himself of late.
How does he do that? According to Ohio State head coach Thad Matta, it might just be a case of playing too fast.
“I think he has got to slow some things down,” Matta said of Tate on Tuesday.
The Buckeyes won seven-straight games prior to Sunday’s 85-60 blowout loss at the hands of Indiana, but even in those games Tate did not play his best basketball.
Tate reached double figures in just two of Ohio State’s last seven games including Sunday's loss. Over that stretch, he’s averaging just 7.3 points and 5.9 rebounds per game, while shooting only 43.3 percent from the field. Compare that to his season averages of 10.4 points, 6.4 boards and 50 percent shooting, and it’s clear Tate is in a bit of a funk.
Things all came to a head Sunday in that loss to the Hoosiers when Tate scored just two points on 1-of-6 shooting and had one rebound. He was visibly frustrated on the floor — as were many of his teammates — in what was the Buckeyes’ worst performance of the season.
Tate sees it as just a rough patch, though, and something he is working through.
“It’s just been — a couple teams have been doubling in the post a little more,” he said Tuesday. “But that’s not an excuse. The shots just weren’t falling. I have just got to concentrate more when I am in those positions and just get the ball in the hole. And if they don’t fall, I still have to find a better way to impact the game.”
Ohio State — and Tate — has the perfect opportunity to bounce back from that disastrous performance against Indiana, though, when it hosts Big Ten bottom feeder Rutgers on Wednesday night.
“After the loss we took, we came back with a chip on our shoulder,” Tate said. “I think we are going to continue to practice well [Tuesday] and play Buckeye basketball, get back to Buckeye basketball.”
Matta is a big picture guy and always has been. He knows the Buckeyes can’t get to where they want to be without Tate getting back to made him a member of the Big Ten’s all-freshman team a year ago.
The hope, for Matta, is his sophomore forward works himself out of this current funk starting Wednesday against the Scarlet Knights.
“I want Jae’Sean playing at his highest level; obviously we are a lot better basketball team when he’s doing that,” Matta said. “Just the mindfulness of sort of being in the moment and focusing on what he can do I think will help him.”
