Buckeyes Escape Bloomington with a Win – Ohio State Buckeyes
2/17/1999 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
February 17, 1999
Box Score
By STEVE HERMAN
AP Sports Writer
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (AP) – Scoonie Penn scored Ohio State’s final eight points Wednesday night, including three free throws in the final minute to lift the 11th-ranked Buckeyes to a 69-67 victory over No. 19 Indiana.
Penn finished with 20 points, 18 in the second half, as Ohio State (20-6, 10-3 Big Ten) completed a two-game sweep of the Hoosiers (19-9, 6-7) for the first time since 1991.
The Buckeyes lost a 14-point lead in the first half, and neither team led in the second half by more than three points until a free throw and basket by Larry Richardson put Indiana ahead 65-61, the Hoosiers’ biggest lead of the game.
That’s when Penn took over.
A 3-pointer by the 5-foot-10 guard brought the Buckeyes within 65-64. He followed that with two free throws with 2:18 to go, but two free throws by Michael Lewis gave Indiana its last lead, 67-66.
Penn was fouled again and hit two more free throws for a 68-67 lead with 49 seconds to go. Then, after A.J. Guyton missed for the Hoosiers, Penn was fouled once more and hit one of two shots for the final point of the game.
An off-balance 3-point attempt by a closely guarded Lewis was no good just ahead of the final buzzer.
Michael Redd added 16 points for the Buckeyes. Indiana was led by Richardson’s career-high 15 points, while Guyton and Kirk Haston had 14 each.
Indiana’s miserable shooting at the start of the game – 5-for-21 – put the Hoosiers in a big hole, but that wasn’t the only reason for the Buckeyes’ quick start. Repeated turnovers and defensive lapses also plagued Indiana from the start, and it wasn’t until Lewis entered the game that the Hoosiers seemed to settle down.
Four straight free throws by Redd gave Ohio State a 27-13 lead when Lewis, who did not play at all in Saturday’s overtime victory at Northwestern, entered the game with 7:14 left in the first half.
A 3-pointer by Luke Recker, who had missed his first six shots, and three free throws by Guyton, who was fouled on a 3-point attempt, brought the Hoosiers within eight.
Haston blocked a shot by Redd, Lewis followed with a 3-pointer and Recker scored on a dunk off a fast-break lob from Lewis to cut the lead to 31-30. Redd, who had 11 points in the first half, ended the Indiana run with a minute to go, and a missed 3-pointer by Guyton kept the Buckeyes’ halftime lead at 33-30.
Two baskets by Richardson early in the second half gave Indiana its first lead since the game’s opening basket, and there were 13 more lead changes before Penn’s clinching free throws.
