Ohio State Men’s Hoops Edged By Kansas – Ohio State Buckeyes
12/23/2000 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Dec. 23, 2000
Box Score| Quotes| Notes
By RUSTY MILLER
AP Sports Writer
COLUMBUS, Ohio – Kenny Gregory had a happy homecoming – barely.
Gregory had 17 points in a return to his hometown and No. 9 Kansas survived Brian Brown’s two shots in the last 11 seconds to beat Ohio State 69-68 on Saturday.
Kansas (10-1) misfired on the front end of three consecutive bonus situations while Ohio State (8-3) ran off the final nine points.
The Buckeyes (8-3), who had won their last six games by an average of 29 points, had the ball the final 33.6 seconds.
Brown, who led the Buckeyes with 17 points, drove the lane but his off-balance shot in heavy traffic with 11 seconds left ended up bouncing out of bounds off a Kansas player. Inbounding again with 7.6 seconds left, the Buckeyes gave the ball to Brown who drove the left wing.
He faked and tried to get Gregory in the air to draw a foul, but Gregory forced Brown to alter his shot. It looped up near the basket and was batted to midcourt by Kansas’ Drew Gooden.
Time expired while the ball was rolling near the giant Ohio State logo at center court.
Gooden added 16 points and 10 rebounds for the Jayhawks, who won their third in a row, while Nick Collison had 10 points.
Boban Savovic hit all 10 of his free throws and had 15 points for the Buckeyes, while Ken Johnson had 11 points, nine rebounds and six blocked shots and Sean Connolly added 11 points.
After they missed their first four shots from the field to start the second half, the Jayhawks relied on their superior strength and height to keep a double-figures lead for most of the half.
Kansas hit nine of its next 11 shots – many on high-low backdoor cuts – to build a 15-point lead.
Gooden scored nine points and Collison had six in the 19-6 run that gave the Jayhawks a 53-38 lead. Gooden also assisted on consecutive baskets by Collison and Gregory, then Gregory had the assists on back-to-back dunks by Collison and Gooden to end the run.
But the Jayhawks were severely hampered by foul trouble. Ohio State was in the double-bonus at the 11:21 mark. With 10 minutes left, Kansas had four players with four fouls apiece. Five Jayhawks finished the game with four fouls.
Ohio State built a 5-0 run around Gregory’s technical foul for hanging on the rim on a dunk to cut it to 57-52 before Gregory nailed a 3-pointer, Mario Kinsey hit a breakaway layup and Luke Axtell added a 3-pointer at the five-minute mark to push the lead back to 10.
The Buckeyes made one last lunge at the Jayhawks. Savovic hit two free throws, Brown scored on a steal and a drive and Connolly popped in a 3 from the top of the circle with 34.9 seconds left to cut the lead to 69-68.
Kansas almost gave the game away at the line.
Kirk Hinrich, an 86-percent free-throw shooter, missed the first of a bonus situation with 55 seconds left and Jeff Boschee, shooting 89.5 percent at the line, missed the front end with 44.1 seconds remaining. Gooden followed suit with 33.6 seconds to go to set up the hectic finish.
The teams combined for 51 fouls.
Ohio State stayed in the game because of free throws. The Buckeyes were 28-of-42 at the line to Kansas’ 6-of-13.
Kansas, on top 34-29 at the half, led by 12 points in the first half and never trailed again after the first five minutes.
An 11-0 run put the Jayhawks on top to stay.
Collison scored inside to start the surge. After Hinrich’s 3-pointer, Gregory scored on a pair of breakaways. The first came after Hinrich was hit in the eye and still whipped a bounce pass that led to the bucket. Then Ohio State’s Tim Martin lost control of the ball and flipped an off-balance pass intercepted by Kansas’ Eric Chenowith, who found Gregory for the dunk.
Boschee closed the run with a pair of free throws.
