Ohio State basketball knocks off No. 1 Duke

It didn’t look good for a while, but the Ohio State basketball team fought its way through some struggles with turnovers and mistakes to knock off No. 1 Duke 71-66 in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge. Maybe it can act as a little salve in the wounds after the Buckeyes lost to arch-rival Michigan on the football field Saturday.

It was really a tale of two halves for Ohio State. The Buckeyes shot the ball well in the first half but missed a slew of free throws and turned the ball over nine times in the first 20 minutes, and Duke went into the half up 43-30 and it looked like it would be OSU’s third loss on the year already.

But not so.

Ohio State kept the Blue Devils in arms reach by locking things down on the defensive end. OSU then turned to Zed Key in the paint who had a monster game against an athletic front line, leading all scorers with 20 points, 11 of it coming in the second half.

Still, the Buckeyes didn’t lead until E.J. Liddell knocked down a pair of free throws with just over 1:00 minute left. OSU’s best player also hit a fade-away mid-range jumper with under 20 seconds left to give Ohio State a three-point lead. Duke would misfire from beyond the arc on the next possession and OSU would close it out at the free-throw line with Cedric Russell knocking two free throws down the shoot to ice it.

Liddell and Cedric Russell joined Key in double figures with 14 and 12 respectively as OSU ended the game on a 14-1 run to pull off the improbable.

With the win, Ohio State improves its record to 5-2 and has now beat a No. 1 ranked team while itself being unranked for the ninth time in school history. That mark leads all programs.

The Buckeyes are next in action and open Big Ten play on Saturday against Penn State.

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Ohio State basketball's history in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge

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