Ohio State basketball: Zed Key saves OSU from embarrassing loss

The Ohio State basketball team got more than it bargained for against Akron. The Buckeyes were coming off a season in 2020-21 where they got a 2-seed in the NCAA Tournament and made the Big Ten Tournament final. None of that mattered Tuesday night, especially to Akron.

In fact, it looked like the Zips were going to beat the Buckeyes in their own building. Ali Ali hit a three-pointer and got fouled by E.J. Liddell with 6 seconds left to tie the game, and then hit the free-throw to take the lead. It looked like Akron was going to win.

Then Zed Key hit a game-winner under the basket with .5 seconds left to give the Buckeyes the one-point victory. The Buckeyes prevailed 67-66 despite Liddell fouling out at the end of the game. Liddell was the only reason this game was even close.

Liddell finished the game with 25 points on 10/19 shooting. He also added 11 rebounds, 3 assists, and 2 blocks. He was the best player on the floor for both teams and Ohio State was completely lost without him on the floor. He’s the only consistent scorer the Buckeyes have.

Key did add 14 points of his own as well. The two big men were the focal point of the offense. What jumped out from this game is the absolute lack of shot creation by anyone other than Liddell. Even Key needs someone to feed him the ball down low to get a shot off.

Ohio State shot an abysmal 28.6% from three, only hitting 4 of them. That’s a far cry from last year when they were the fourth-best three-point shooting team in the Big Ten at a 36% clip. They don’t look to have anyone who can hit that shot besides Justin Ahrens.

Justice Sueing was terrible, going 1/7 and shooting a few air-balls. The starting backcourt didn’t hit a shot from the field. I truly don’t know who is going to create shots on this team. I don’t know where scoring comes from besides Liddell. Key is probably the second-best player on the team, but you can’t play two bigs all the time.

Chris Holtmann needs to figure his team out. The Ohio State basketball team can’t be beating MAC teams by just one on their home floor.