Devin Harris has Ohio State’s number.
The star UW junior followed up a 29-point performance Jan. 28 in Columbus with a 33-point outburst Saturday to lead Wisconsin past Ohio State 78-48.
In addition to his scoring output — his third 30-point effort in four games — Harris pulled down six rebounds and dealt four assists.
“I think he did a great job of running the show for us,” guard Clayton Hanson said. “You look at his points, but he did a good job of keeping spacing and kept the ball moving. We got open looks because of it.”
The last Wisconsin player to record three 30-point games in a season was Michael Finley, who did so in the 1993-94 season.
“He’s every bit as good as any guard that I’ve seen in college basketball in a while,” Ohio State head coach Jim O’Brien said. “He’s elevated his game to another level. He’s just a load to have to guard. He’s got tremendous quickness, he’s great with the ball and you’ve got to get up on him because he can shoot. He’s murder in the open court and he’ll take you down to the block and post you up.”
The contest proved to be a seesaw affair for most of the first half. After a three-pointer and a lay-up from guard J.J. Sullinger, reserve forward Shun Jenkins gave the Buckeyes a 13-9 lead with 12:04 remaining in the half.
The four-point advantage, however, would be the largest of the game for Ohio State, which saw its lead erased by a pair of Harris free throws and a jumper from Hanson.
For the game, Harris would make 16 of 18 free throws.
UW appeared to be running away with the game following an 8-0 run with under eight minutes left, but Ohio State got hot and made a run of its own. The Buckeyes reeled off ten consecutive points, including three-pointers from Sullinger and Tony Stockman. Stockman’s deep ball at the 3:17 mark gave OSU its first lead in nearly eight minutes.
After UW center Mike Wilkinson knocked down a pair of free throws to regain the lead for Wisconsin, sophomore Buckeye guard Ricardo Billings capped a baseline drive with a two-handed flush that gave Ohio State a 28-27 lead.
The dunk proved to be the turning point of the game, as Billings was assessed a technical foul for slapping the backboard. The Buckeyes’ short lived one-point edge would be their last lead of the night. Harris made one of the two technical free throws, igniting a 9-0 Wisconsin run in the final 2:46 of the half.
With 19 seconds remaining, Harris stroked a deep ball that sent the Badgers into the locker room with a 36-28 lead.
Ohio State would draw no closer than nine points in the second half, which saw Wisconsin transform an eight-point advantage into a 30-point runaway win.
Sullinger sank two free throws and a jumper to make the count 43-34 in favor of UW with 14:16 on the clock. From that point on, Harris took over. He scored 12 of the next 14 Wisconsin points, and the one basket he did not score was a Boo Wade lay-up that resulted from a Harris assist.
“We tried to call a couple of timeouts, we had a hard time scoring and Devin Harris basically took the game over during that one stretch when they really, really pulled away,” O’Brien said of the second half.
UW continued to open the game up at the free throw line, scoring 12 of their final 21 points at the charity stripe.
The Badgers’ defense limited the Buckeyes to six field goals and a 25 percent field goal percentage in the second half.
“Our players did defensively what we talked about doing for the past two days,” Wisconsin head coach Bo Ryan said. “That’s a nice sign. That kind of response is good. They moved their feet, they chased on the shooters–we only had one or two foul-ups on whether we were going over or under on screens. Other than that, they stuck with the rules pretty well. Ohio State was playing pretty well coming in here.”
Wilkinson turned in another workmanlike performance, scoring 14 points and collecting seven rebounds and three steals. Hanson led all bench players with ten points.
The Buckeyes were led by Sullinger’s 14 points. Brandon Fuss-Cheatham picked up seven points before fouling out with 14:45 left in the game.
Wisconsin has now won 26 consecutive games at the Kohl Center. The Badgers next take on Illinois Wednesday in Champaign, Ill.
“Everyone’s got a lot of confidence on this team now going on the road,” Wilkinson said. “It just shows that we can play with anybody, whether it be small guys like Iowa or if they put a bigger lineup out there like they did today. You have to have a team effort. As long as we continue to do what we did today on both ends of the court we can be tough anywhere we play.”
