On January 12, the men's basketball teams in Columbus and Bloomington had identical records.
Ohio State and Indiana were starting to wobble right as the calendar turned to 2023. Both had started a respectable 10-3, but matching three-game skids later they were 10-6. A mutually brutal start to conference play.
Silver lining, it was still early January. Good news, both teams had plenty of talent. Room to improve; time to bounce back.
Neither program has ever been comfortable dropping two straight, or even just a single game, so three in a row was rarified squalor. Ohio State and Indiana both own north of 1,800 wins apiece while winning well north of 60% of their games historically.
Losing isn't comfortable. Even just winning at both schools isn't savored enough. It's too expected.
There aren't many three-game slides on either program ledger. When it happens, it's a crisis situation on both campuses. IU had been predicted to win the B1G regular season, while Chris Holtmann's ever-transitioning Buckeyes were picked a respectable 6th.
March is for beautiful, shattered dreams. Just not this year. Not in columbus.
Hard to do either losing three straight. Both were ranked in the preseason and remained in the polls or receiving votes all the way through that tenuous week in January when their dueling three-game skids put them at the same crossroads.
And that's the last time Ohio State and Indiana occupied the same space this season. For now.
The Hoosiers have gone a respectable 10-4 since that slide, sweeping Illinois and Purdue and solidifying their grip on a high NCAA Tournament seed. That's a 70ish% clip, higher than the Hoosiers' historical average.
Hard to criticize, except it's IU basketball - their stakeholders share a similar disease and symptoms to those claimed by Ohio State football. The Hoosiers have lost three of their last five, including two blowouts - one in East Lansing and one last night at home against Iowa.
This is not good enough for IU, even with Mike Woodson still in his second season repairing what Archie Miller left behind. His disastrous tenure concluded with a six-game skid to end 2021; an impossible and unacceptable slide in Bloomington. And previously, in Columbus.
The Buckeyes are a brutal 2-11 since their first three-game skid - which became a five-game skid - and added another nine-game losing streak to their record after that. We're all out of dreams to dash in Columbus, which is the prevailing value proposition of paying attention to college basketball.
Because when March arrives everything is possible. January and February are distant memories. No one can even remember December. March is for beautiful, shattered dreams. Just not this year.
Ohio State hasn't and will not sweep any conference foe this season, including Minnesota - which would be winless if not for a 70-67 win in Value City Arena on the night Ohio State's first three-game slide materialized.
The Buckeyes did not get better as January faded and February arrived. Silver lining, it was hard for them to get worse. Good news, it doesn't matter now. Tonight is Senior Night, and Ohio State has already spoiled its journey.
But its destination is still intact. This team was never going to win the conference or the national title.
With postseason play approaching, here's how all Big 10 teams have fared over their last 10 games: pic.twitter.com/ZLHppMegiP
— CBB Analytics (@CBBAnalytics) March 1, 2023
The Buckeyes simply should have been, well, much better than this. They never recovered from losing to the worst Power 5 team outside of Louisville, which is an indictment of both coaching and culture. They couldn't beat the otherwise-winless Gophers in Columbus, and unfortunately there are too many other data points to chalk that evening to being just one bad night.
So now the Hoosiers are 20-10 (11-8) while the Buckeyes are 11-17 (4-14), and both teams will still conclude their seasons with a loss this month. This is March. Where every single story except one regresses to the same unsatisfying ending. We were only denied an enjoyable middle.
Sixty-seven of the 68 teams that make the NCAA tournament - your team won't be among them - will conclude their seasons with a loss this month. Three lucky programs will finish with crushing losses in early April at the Final Four in Houston.
And one program will secure the exclusive Shining Moment™. There are no December Bowl games in March Madness, and even if there were this year's Buckeyes aren't anywhere close to bowl eligibility. College basketball's structural flaw is why the quality of journey is so important.
Feb 26, 2023; Columbus, Ohio, USA; Ohio State Buckeyes forward Justice Sueing (14) takes the shot over Illinois Fighting Illini forward Matthew Mayer (24) during the second half at Value City Arena. Mandatory Credit: Joseph Maiorana-USA TODAY Sports
This season, Ohio State excused its fans from dreaming too hard. Silver lining, it's almost over. Good news, they'll try again later this year with what has to be the program's bottom as a muse.
As for this month, the Buckeyes are heading toward the same crowded bin as the higher-quality Hoosiers, albeit on dramatically different paths. If IU can finally win the conference tournament for which it always hold home court advantage, its season will hold some differentiation against all of the others.
It's not the banner they want, but it definitely is the one they need. Ohio State's issues run deeper than just having the simple but important capability of avoiding nine-game losing streaks.
This year's Buckeyes provided a glimpse back to Thad Matta's decline, when chronic underperformers like Marc Loving and Amir Williams were always on the floor, consistently making the same mistakes and ultimately losing games a program like Ohio State should win - with seemingly no one available or capable to relieve them.
On Saturday while the Buckeyes were upsetting Illinois and ending a nine-game slide (that's three three-game skids in a row for the math-deficient) play-by-play announcer Paul Keels could be heard on the broadcast talking around the chronic issues plaguing the Buckeyes in his imitable deadpan:
Justice Sueing shoots...and it's too late. Shot clock violation. He had no idea what the shot clock was.
Sueing has played college basketball since 2017. Former Villanova coach Jay Wright provided color for the broadcast, pointing out several flaws in Sueing's strategy for attacking the basket. His technique and mechanics were all but eliminating the possibility of drawing a foul. He was missing those shots while putting himself in suboptimal position for success.
Wright made simple suggestions to the television audience of what Sueing could do differently to be more successful. It's unclear if Holtmann could hear what he was saying from his end of the sideline, but it's also mystifying that that color commentary could be outpacing Ohio State's technical coaching.
Wright won multiple national championships and was unable to contain the coaching from spilling out of his mouth, which is what makes his color contributions so good. He concluded the broadcast by lauding Holtmann for keeping the team together during its latest losing streak, which is a curious way to land the plane he had been professionally ransacking the previous two hours.
The Buckeyes still defeated the Illini on the strength of their freshmen, similar to how Indiana has benefited from the talents of freshman guard Jalen Hood-Schifino. He and Buckeye star freshman Bryce Sensabaugh will either share the Freshman of the Year award at the conclusion of the season or finish 1-2 in the voting.
If they stick around another year or two, their programs' respective journeys should gain quality points in the future. Indiana left a lot of them on the floor this season. Ohio State forfeited most of them.
The Buckeyes' forgettable season will not be remembered for the wins over Rutgers, Northwestern, Iowa and Illinois - all of whom will meet Indiana's fate later this month away from campus. They'll be dancing, which is the baseline expectation.
The Hoosiers will make it into the tournament, where they'll go out the same way as 66 other teams. Alas, the Buckeyes won't be a part of it. Silver lining, they weren't close to getting in.
Good news, they're all done breaking your heart. But there's always next year.
