Ohio State has taken the outright lead in the Big Ten standings.
The Buckeyes upset the No. 3 team in the country on Wednesday night, continuing their Cinderella first season under Chris Holtmann, defeating Purdue 64-63 to improve to 12-1 in conference play – while handing the Boilermakers their first Big Ten loss of the year – to move the Buckeyes into first place in the conference standings.
Ohio State's Keita Bates-Diop, who led the Buckeyes with 18 points for the game, scored the game-winning basket with 2.8 seconds remaining.
After a missed shot by Jae'Sean Tate with Ohio State trailing by one and just five seconds remaining, Bates-Diop saved the day and led the Buckeyes to their biggest win of the season to date, rebounding the ball and quickly putting it into the basket, giving the Buckeyes a one-point advantage that would hold as Purdue's Isaac Haas missed a potential game-winner at the buzzer.
| TEAM | 1 | 2 | F |
|---|---|---|---|
| #14 OHIO STATE | 29 | 35 | 64 |
| #3 PURDUE | 31 | 32 | 63 |
Ohio State kept Wednesday's game close throughout the first half – even though it didn't score a single point for the first five minutes and 34 seconds – as Purdue took a lead of only two points, 31-29, into the break.
Purdue started to take control of the game in the first 10 minutes of the second half, leading by as many as 14 points, but Ohio State clawed its way back into the game, outscoring the Boilermakers 25-10 in the final 10 minutes.
Andre Wesson scored 13 points for the Buckeyes, including a crucial banked three-pointer with just over one minute to play that helped lead to the victory, while Tate and Musa Jallow each had 10.
| OHIO STATE | STAT | PURDUE |
|---|---|---|
| 64 | POINTS | 63 |
| 24-57 (42.1%) | FGM-FGA (PCT.) | 20-47 (42.6%) |
| 6-18 (33.3%) | 3PM-3PA (PCT.) | 8-20 (40.0%) |
| 10-16 (62.5%) | FTM-FTA (PCT.) | 15-19 (78.9%) |
| 8 | TURNOVERS | 12 |
| 31 | TOTAL REBOUNDS | 30 |
| 6 | OFFENSIVE REBOUNDS | 2 |
| 25 | DEFENSIVE REBOUNDS | 28 |
| 18 | BENCH POINTS | 0 |
| 1 | BLOCKS | 4 |
| 7 | STEALS | 5 |
| 15 | ASSISTS | 14 |
Carsen Edwards led the Boilermakers with 28 points in defeat.
Haas had a dominant first half for the Boilermakers, scoring 16 first-half points while drawing three first-half fouls on Kaleb Wesson and two first-half fouls on both Micah Potter and Kyle Young, but the Buckeyes managed to slow Haas down in the second half, though – even though Kaleb Wesson rode the pine for nearly the entire second half with four fouls – as the 7-foot-2 center scored only two second-half points.
The Buckeyes are now 21-5 for the season as a whole and 12-1 against Big Ten opponents, technically tied in conference record with Purdue but now holding the head-to-head tiebreaker in regards to conference tournament seeding should both teams win the same number of games for the remainder of the season.
Ohio State will look to keep its winning ways going on Saturday when the Buckeyes play Iowa at 6 p.m. at Value City Arena.
