As he prepared to coach a team with no seniors and only one junior a year ago, Ohio State coach Thad Matta said he spent his preseason doing much more teaching than he had done during previous seasons. The Buckeyes were young and Matta had to coach differently in the preseason to cope with that.
Fast-forward a year and Ohio State is more experienced, but still relatively young. The Buckeyes have just one senior in Marc Loving, but they do return a six-man core that played the bulk of the minutes last season.
But even though Ohio State may be a year older, Matta approached this preseason in a similar way since the Buckeyes aren’t exactly old just yet.
“Honestly, it’s been a lot of the same in terms of what we want these guys to do and trying to get them to understand how they can affect, both offensively and defensively, with who they are and not trying to be somebody that they’re not,” Matta said Friday. “We want them to utilize their talents the best that they can for the betterment of the basketball team.”
Ohio State plays its lone exhibition in preparation for the 2016-17 season Sunday. The Buckeyes host Walsh at 4 p.m. at Value City Arena. Ohio State’s season-opener is scheduled for next Friday at Navy.
Matta hopes the added instruction in the preseason leads to the performance he wants to see in the Buckeyes’ only tune-up before the real show begins.
“I think a lot will be known on Sunday just in terms of sort of how we play with the lights on,” Matta said. “We’ve had what I consider more good days than bad days and so much with these guys is just trying to get the little things down that we want.
“What I’m looking for on Sunday is just for us to do the things that we’ve deemed to be really, really important and do those well and do them every single time.”
Junior forward Keita Bates-Diop said the Buckeyes will use the matchup with the Cavaliers as a barometer to measure the team’s progress heading into the season.
“It’s just kind of to make sure that we are where we think we are,” Bates-Diop said. “We don’t want to have a bunch of holes on offense or defense where we have to go back and work on things five days before we play our first game. It’s just kind of tuning up.”
Matta said he’s pleased with the progress his team has made throughout the preseason. Of course he did, as coaches would never say anything else at this point in the year.
Ohio State is in search of a bounceback season after missing the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2008. Matta hopes the instruction by him and the coaching staff, in addition to difficult practices, gets the Buckeyes back on track.
“I’ve probably practiced this team harder than most that we’ve had,” Matta said, “just trying to get that core — our halfcourt offense, halfcourt defense — as good as we possibly can at this time of the year.”
