Ohio State Buckeyes Men's Basketball Season

It won't be long before the talented Ohio State Buckeyes team makes another go at it, this time against Purdue Fort Wayne. There are a lot of returning players and the biggest name is Junior Center Kaleb Wesson. He actually threw his name into the NBA draft last year but decided to return for another year. Last year, he averaged 14 points and 6 rebounds. The only scholarship senior with the basketball club is Kaleb's older brother Andre who is a premiere force on the defensive end. Since he is the only senior on the team, he is expected to be a leader for the team. The freshmen and sophomores will certainly hear a lot from him as the league goes along. Walk-on Danny Hummer is also returning as a red-shirt Senior for the Buckeyes.

Ohio State Returning Starters

Two more starters are also returning in Forward Kyle Young and Guard Luther Muhammad. Muhammad is poised for a breakout year after his production took a dip last year with a shoulder injury. He is expected to bounce back this year after he noticeably put a lot of work in before the season started.

Buckeye Freshman Class

The freshmen class is pretty deep with Center Ibrahima Diallo, Forward Alonzo Gaffney, Forward E.J Liddell and Guard DJ Carton. All these players are expected to contribute right away. In fact, Wesson, Carton and Liddell are known to be called State Mr. Basketball in the past so they are expected to play a lot of minutes this year. We've already seen Carton play a significant amount of time at Point Guard with Liddell coming in to relieve Kaleb Wesson when he needs a break.

OSU Coaches

Coach Chris Holtmann is entering his third season as coach of the Buckeyes and things turned out the way he hoped it would be in the past two years. He guided the team to the NCAA tournament the past two years and they are expected to do so again this year. Last year was a little rough after the loss of JaeSean Tate (Graduated) and Keita Bates-Diop (NBA). They finished 20-15 and 8-12 in the Big Ten conference.

One player who won't be returning this year to the lineup of the Buckeyes is CJ Jackson but the Buckeyes already have pegged CJ Walker as his replacement at point guard. He missed the entire year with an injury but he figures to return this year better than ever.

Ohio State v Cincinnati

The Buckeyes lead Cincinnati all time in their head to head matchup and the first game of the season was no different for Ohio State. In fact, the Buckeyes won the last 3 games against the Bearcats so they were expected to be favored in the game. It was held in a different place this time around than prior years. And the Bearcats did not have too many players returning from last year. They had a lot of new faces coming in and were welcoming the challenge of facing the Buckeyes prior to the defeat. For the Cincinnati game, all eyes were on Jarron Cumberland and Buckeyes threw a lot of good defenders at him. Only time will tell if he will be able to be successful operating in the low post in later games this season.

In Ohio State's exhibition games, the Buckeyes showed a lot of depth. They have a lot of players who can excel when they are needed. The game with Cincinnati was expected to go down the wire since the Bearcats don't go down without a fight. Last year, the Buckeyes started the year with a 12-1 record but they suffered a few losses after that. With most of their good players returning, great things are expected to come.