Scotty Middleton unavailable for first round of NIT, attending to family matter
COLUMBUS — Ohio State freshman wing Scotty Middleton is unavailable for the Buckeyes’ first-round NIT matchup against Cornell Tuesday night.
Middleton is not in the transfer portal. Rather, he’s back home attending to a family matter, per source. The breakout first year is expected back for Ohio State’s next NIT game, should the Buckeyes beat the Big Red and advance to the second round of the 32-team tournament.
Middleton is averaging 4.4 points per game this season but 6.3 points per game since Jake Diebler took over as head coach. During that eight-game span, Middleton has shot a blistering 65% from beyond the arc. In other words, he’s converted 13-of-20 3-pointers.
He recorded four multi-make 3-point games in that run. To put that in perspective, Middleton had logged three such outings in his first 22 appearances for the Buckeyes.
Middleton also brought back the defensive intensity he delivered at the beginning of the season, serving as a catalyst for several Buckeyes transition buckets.
After making a good first impression in non-conference play, Middleton had a rough start to 2024. While Ohio State dropped 8-of-9 games from Jan. 6 to Feb. 6., Middleton missed two games. He didn’t play against Penn State on Jan. 20 — the Buckeyes’ lone win in that winter slump — because of his violation of team rules, and he didn’t play at Iowa on Feb. 2 because of an ankle injury. Middleton said he actually twisted both of his ankles this season, another obstacle to navigate in a season full of hardships.
In the seven games Middleton played during Ohio State’s month-long Big Ten slide, he wasn’t the 3-and-D contributor he proved to be at the beginning of the year. He converted just 3-of-12 attempts from long range, plus he scored more than five points only once in that span.
By mid-February, seventh-year Buckeyes head coach Chris Holtmann — the man who signed Middleton as part of the Buckeyes’ 2023 recruiting class — was fired with six regular season games left.
Ohio State as a whole could have folded, and Middleton especially could have thrown in the towel. Instead, he continued to work.
“I think honestly, it was just like my family and friends and my teammates and coaches just believing in me,” Middleton said. “They never stopped believing me. No matter what. If I shot it bad that night or I played bad that night, they always just stayed with me and just stuck with me and just always kept telling me to just keep going.”
Middleton’s persistence paid off.
But the Buckeyes won’t have his lift on either end Tuesday night against Cornell.
