Calling Ohio State's weekend win at Wisconsin a season saver isn't completely accurate, not with this much season left.
It did bring a collective sigh of relief inside the Buckeyes locker room, however brief. Tuesday night, No. 25 is back in action and back on the road at No. 13 Iowa.
"A typical Big Ten week," Ohio State coach Thad Matta said Monday.
It's a week Ohio State begins squarely in the middle, one of four teams tied for fifth place in the crowded conference race. A lineup change -- Shannon Scott asked out of the starting lineup -- and the kind of defense these Buckeyes will have to play spurred a 59-58 win at Wisconsin which, like Ohio State, is now 17-5 and 4-5 in conference play.
Besides having lost five of six before the Wisconsin game, the Buckeyes found themselves sliding in the standings, searching for confidence -- this team was once 15-0 -- and wondering about their future. By the Ratings Percentage Index, one criterion the NCAA tournament committee will use to select and seed teams next month, Ohio State's best win before beating Wisconsin, currently 12th in the RPI, was over No. 51 North Dakota State.
Now, the Buckeyes aim for another and their first bit of revenge on the season. Iowa's 84-74 win in Columbus on Jan. 12 stamped the Hawkeyes as a contender and displayed Ohio State's warts, specifically its struggles to get big baskets to stop opposing runs. Iowa went with a zone defense down the stretch and attacked Ohio State with dribble penetration by Roy Devyn Marble and the Buckeyes didn't answer either sufficiently.
Tuesday night, it's another clash of styles and another game in which both teams badly need.
"We're halfway through Big Ten play, and it's maybe as challenging as I've ever seen it," Matta said. "Anybody can beat anyone on any given evening."
Case in point: Both Ohio State and Wisconsin are now a half-game behind Northwestern in the Big Ten standings. Northwestern started league play losing by 28, 23 and 26 and now has won four of five, three on the road at Indiana, Wisconsin and Minnesota.
Following the trip to third-place Iowa, Ohio State hosts Purdue on Saturday and Michigan on Feb. 11. Michigan suffered its first league loss on Sunday at Indiana and is atop the league with Michigan State at 8-1.
At Wisconsin, LaQuinton Ross scored 13 and reserve Amedeo Della Valle was the only other Buckeye to score in double figures with 11. Ohio State expects to see more zone and to see Iowa force the Buckeyes to try to beat them from the outside. The Buckeyes are shooting just 33.5 percent on 3-point tries in Big Ten play.
"After the (first Iowa) game, we made a lot of changes," Matta said. "Hopefully we'll be a better zone offense team tomorrow night.
"That's one of the things about conference play that is so challenging is, win or lose, there's gotta be that element (of moving forward). I don't think guys will be thinking like, 'Hey, these guys beat us last time.' It's more, 'What do we have to do to win the basketball game?'"
Iowa also has a big week with Michigan coming to town Saturday, and Hawkeyes coach Fran McCaffery knows his team is seeing a different Ohio State team than the one it saw a little over three weeks ago.
"The way that (the Buckeyes) maintained their composure and kind of kept coming (at Wisconsin), and then played better at crunch time is what most people have come to expect from an Ohio State team, from a Thad Matta-coached team," McCaffery said. "That's what we're preparing for."
