When Ohio State took the floor Sunday for its exhibition game against Walsh, a hard-to-believe thought popped into the mind of Buckeyes head coach Thad Matta. He was about to coach a game with a team consisting of just three guys who had ever played a game before at Ohio State.
With sophomore forward Jae’Sean Tate sidelined due to a sprained ankle and former walk-on senior Jake Lorbach out with a concussion, junior Marc Loving and sophomores Keita Bates-Diop and Kam Williams were the only players available who had ever suited up in the scarlet and gray.
That amount of inexperience wasn’t necessarily shocking to Matta — he knew his team was going to be one of the youngest in all of college basketball this season — but it sort of all hit him at once as he prepared for his team’s first game of the year last Sunday.