Ohio State basketball: Joey Brunk leads Bucks to victory

You read that headline right; this was the Joey Brunk game. The Ohio State basketball team needed a win after losing the last two games in a row to bad teams. They needed someone other than E.J. Liddell and Malaki Branham to step up and do something.

Enter Joey Brunk. Brunk had by far his game with Ohio State, scoring 18 points en route to a 80-69 win. He scored 10 of those in the first half. He was so good that the Buckeyes were running plays for him and Michigan State had to double-team him in the second half. Brunk was starting due to both Zed Key and Kyle Young being out.

Jamari Wheeler was someone else who stepped up. Wheeler hit some big threes early in the game. He finished 4-8 from deep and scored 16 points. Those were all big points because he was getting open shots with MSU crashing on Brunk and Liddell.

Speaking of Liddell, he was really freaking good yet again. He finished with 19 points on 6-12 shooting. He also had 8 rebounds and 3 assists. Once again, he was the best player on the floor. Liddell was the reason Brunk was able to be so effective because defenders were focused on him.

Branham was really good in this game as well, scoring 22 points. He wasn’t as efficient as he has been of late, shooting 9-16. He got going more in the second half after a rough first half. It didn’t matter because of how well Brunk and Wheeler played in the first half.

This was a must-win for the Ohio State basketball team. They needed to stop their slide in the worst way and did so in style. These were two desperate teams playing each other, and the Buckeyes were able to come out on top.

Hopefully, the Buckeyes can play like this in their finale against TTUN.