Ohio State Locks Up OT Win Over Illinois, College Roundup

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (AP) -- With 14 seconds left on the clock in overtime Thursday, Ohio State led Illinois by three points but the Buckeyes needed one last stop.

Illiniois' Malcolm Hill lost the ball near the Buckeye basket, Keita Bates-Diop came up with it and fed Mickey Mitchell, who loped to the other end of the court for an easy layup with four seconds left that locked up a 68-63 win.

''I'm still trying to figure out how Mickey Mitchell came out of there with that basketball,'' Ohio State coach Thad Matta said. ''I've never seen anything like it. I'm glad he did.''

The end may not have made much sense to Matta, but the win was tough to figure out, too.

Both teams played sloppy. Ohio State (14-8, 6-3 Big Ten) hit 39 percent of its shots and Illinois just 32 percent.

''It wasn't always pretty, but both teams were going at it,'' Illinois coach John Groce said.
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Trevor Thompson, who led Ohio State with 16 points, acknowledged that a month earlier the young Buckeyes might not have come out of the game with a win.

''I feel like we've definitely grown up,'' he said.

JaQuan Lyle hit a pair of free throws, his only points of the night, with 14 seconds left in overtime to put the Buckeyes up 66-63 before Mitchell iced the game.

The Illini (10-11, 2-6) trailed by 13 with 6:34 to play but fought back and tied the game at 58-58 on a 3-pointer by Jalen Coleman-Lands with 56.9 seconds left in regulation.

But Illinois scored just five points in overtime.

Bates-Diop finished with 15 points and 12 rebounds for Ohio State and Marc Loving scored 11 with 10 boards.

Kendrick Nunn led Illinois with 24 points, including five 3-pointers.

The Buckeyes used a big offensive rebounding edge, 13-5, to put away a dozen second-chance points. Illinois had just four.

In all, the Buckeyes grabbed 51 rebounds to Illinois' 34.

And the Illini were 18-31 from the free throw line.

Illinois opened the game with a 13-2 lead. But the Illini had just one field goal, a jumper by Nunn, between the 11:25 mark of the first half and halftime.

Hill finished with 12 points for the Illini and Coleman-Lands 11.

Ohio State's Jae'Sean Tate fouled out in overtime. He finished with nine points.

EIU Wins Over UT Martin

Eastern Illinois collected 16 offensive rebounds on Thursday and second chance points proved to be the difference as the Panthers beat UT Martin, 82-74, in Lantz Arena.  EIU converted those 16 offensive boards into 16 second chance points with A.J. Riley pulling down four of his 11 rebounds on the offensive glass.
 
EIU improved to 8-13 overall, 5-4 in the OVC.  EIU will play at SIU Edwardsville on Saturday at 5 p.m. with the game televised on Fox Sports Midwest.  UTM fell to 10-12 overall, 2-5 in the OVC.
 
The second chance points along with some timely 3-point shooting allowed the Panthers to overcome a 50 percent shooting night by the Skyhawks.
 
Demetrius McReynolds had the hot hand for the Panthers in the second half scoring 20 of his 27 points in the half.  It was the third time this season the junior guard has scored 19 or more points in a half.  McReynolds opened the second half with back-to-back 3-pointers allowing EIU to extend the lead to four points.  McReynolds big shot of the half was a four-point play which gave EIU a 59-55 lead with 12:44 to play.
 
UT Martin countered by dumping the ball in the paint where they had a 38-24 points in the paint scoring advantage.  Javier Martinez had 12 points off the bench with six of them during a six minute stretch that saw UTM take a 71-68 lead with 5:53 to play.  Jacolby Mobley sank a pair of 3-pointers during the same time frame for the Skyhawks.
 
After Mobley’s second 3-pointer at the 5:53 mark, EIU went on a 9-0 run with two free throws by McReynolds, two buckets by Trae Anderson and a 3-pointer by Cornell Johnston.  Johnston’s 3-pointer with 3:14 left to play staked EIU to a 77-71 lead as the Panthers held off the Skyhawks with three free throws and an Anderson lay-up.   Anderson scored 17 points with eight rebounds.  Johnston had 18 points.  Riley had seven points and six assists to go with his 11 rebounds.
 
UT Martin shot 50 percent in both halves but was 8-of-23 from 3-point range on the night.  Twymond Howard led UTM with 14 points.  Myles Taylor (11 points) and Alex Anderson (10 points) also finished in double figures.
 

SE Missouri Defeats SIUE

Southeast Missouri went on a 19-4 run late in the second half and defeated SIUE men's basketball 58-51 at the Vadalabene Center.

The Redhawks improved to 5-16 overall and 2-6 in the Ohio Valley Conference while the Cougars dropped to 4-17 overall and 1-8 in the OVC.

SIUE Head Coach Jon Harris said he will continue to push his team to get better one step at a time.

"We have a lot of guys who are capable of doing things," said Harris. "It's a good problem, but it's a problem because we can't play everybody. We have a lot of guys doing good things. They are competitive in practice and push each other, and we have to find a way to be better come game time."

SIUE went up 45-38 with 6:49 to play in the game on a pair of free throws by Burak Eslik, who led all scorers with 16 points. The Redhawks answered with the next nine points, gaining its first lead of the contest since midway through the first half. Trey Kellum connected on a pair of free throws with 3:15 left that put Southeast up 47-45.

The Cougars tied the game 47-47 with 3:01 left on two free throws from freshman Carlos Anderson.

Southeast Missouri took the lead for good on a three-point play by Kellum with 2:08 to play. Kellum would finish the game with 14 points. Jamaal Calvin was Southeast's leading scorer with 15 points, including six free throws in the final 41 seconds of the game.