What Ohio State coach Jake Diebler said after the Buckeyes loss to Illinois

COLUMBUS – The Buckeyes fell to Illinois 88-80 on Tuesday night. Following the loss, Ohio State head coach Jake Diebler met with the Lettermen Row and the assembled media.

Below what he had to say about Ohio State’s loss to the Illini.

Diebler’s opening statement:

“Certainly want give Coach Underwood and Illinois credit. They came in and played really well. We knew that they were a really good team, I think one of the better teams in the entire country. That was evident on film and they played like it tonight. As far as we go, I thought there were some good, tough stretches. And then there were some stretches where we didn’t play with the poise that we needed to. And against a really good team that’s how you come up short.

Proud of the way we fought back multiple times. Rebounding was a really, really big focal point for us going into the game. And I thought for the most part, we battled really hard and rebounded pretty well for majority of the game. So I got to dissect this and learn from it. Certainly duplicate the stretches that were really good. We need more of those, but we got to clean up some of those self-inflicted wounds that really good teams make you pay every time you do that.”

Diebler on how Illinois guarded Bruce Thornton in the second half:

“They put a little bit more size on him. I thought a couple of his looks were really good. And we try to get him in the ball in different spots. He’s got to continue to be really aggressive because he had it going. There’s no question about that. I thought him only getting to the free throw line one time, something’s not right about that. And we got to go back and look why that is in a game where, there’s 48 fouls called and the way he’s guarded with the physicality he’s guarded with. 

“It’s very surprising to me that a player of that caliber gets to the free throw line one time, gets two attempts. So we’ll see, some of that could be him and he’s got to initiate more contact. Cause it felt like those type of plays were being honored tonight where offense initiating contact but I mean, he had 34, 6 and 6. So I don’t know what there is to really pick at aside from him not getting to the free throw line when it seemed like a lot of free throws were being had and him not getting there more. So maybe some of that’s on him. We got to go back and look at that. But yeah, I think that’s it.”