Women's Basketball
Slow Start Dooms Buckeyes on Snowy Night at Illinois
By John Porentas

A winter storm gripped Champaign before the start of the OSU vs. Illinois game keeping fans away and leading to a crowd of under 300 in the arena. For a big part of the first half, the Buckeyes were no-shows too.

Illinois (12-9, 4-6 Big Ten) scored the first eight points of the game and went up by 14 points with just over 10 minutes played. The Illini then had just enough to hold off OSU (16-5, 7-3 Big Ten) to claim a 68-64 win and break a four-game losing streak that started on January 17 against the Buckeyes in Columbus.

"I just think at the beginning of the game we weren't competing," lamented OSU Head Coach Jim Foster who was obviously not happy with the way his team approached the contest.

"They got out to an 8-0 lead and I don't think we contested a shot in the first five or six minutes of the basketball game.

"I don't think you win a lot of games doing that. I don't think you win a lot of games by conceding a portion of the game," Foster said.

The Buckeyes were able to rally in the latter stages of the second half and trailed by only one at the intermission at 35-34. OSU actually held brief leads in the second half, but just could not sustain the kind of consistency of play needed to win on the road. Careless mistakes at critical moments cost them any hope of rallying for win.

"We only had 13 turnovers, but they led directly to 19 points. That's a huge number," said Foster.

"I think we had some very bad turnovers, turnovers that lead directly to field goals for them.

"Some of our turnovers were just so poor. The basic, fundamental concept of pivoting would have create a better pass," Foster said.

The Illini were able to answer every challenge by the Buckeyes in the second half to hold on for the win, but when the game was over Foster was left simmering about his team's poor start to begin the game.

"We didn't compete at the beginning and they did," Foster said.

"They played very, very hard and I give them a lot of credit. They lost six of their last seven games and they played with much more spirit and intensity than we did."

Illinois' Jenna Smith led all scorers with 20 points and registered a double-double with 10 rebounds as well. Lori Bjork added 16 for the Illini on the strength of three of five shooting from three point range and five of seven overall from the field. Ohio State was led by freshman center Jantel Lavender with 19 points. Senior guard Marscilla Packer added 17 for OSU.

With the loss OSU falls into a three-way tie with Purdue and Iowa at the top of the Big Ten standing with identical league marks of 7-3. Both Purdue and Iowa won tonight to draw into the three-way tie with the Buckeyes.

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