TicketsBy Bill Koch
GoBearcats.com
CINCINNATI – The in-state rivalry, if you can all it a rivalry, dates all the way back to 1905, but includes only 10 games. Ohio State leads the series against the University of Cincinnati Bearcats, 6-4 and has won the last two games. But the Bearcats won the two that counted the most when they knocked off the Buckeyes in the national championship games of 1961 and 1962.
Now the two largest schools in Ohio, separated by roughly a 100-mile stretch of I-71, will get together again when the Buckeyes make an extremely rare appearance in Cincinnati to play the Bearcats at 6 p.m. Wednesday at Fifth Third Arena in the regular-season opener for both teams.
The occasion is the first regular-season game in the 29-year-old arena, which has been renovated at a cost of $87 million. UC will return the game next season at Schottenstein Center in Columbus.
"It's great that we're playing," UC coach Mick Cronin said Monday. "Hopefully we can play for a long time."
This will be the first time UC and Ohio State have played each other at UC since Jan. 3, 1920 when the Buckeyes posted a 35-13 win at Schmidlapp Hall. After the Bearcats posted a 33-17 win over OSU in Columbus, they've met only once during the regular season. That was during Cronin's first season at UC in 2006-07 at the Wooden Tradition in Indianapolis. The fourth-ranked Buckeyes, who played in the national title game that season, overwhelmed the depleted Bearcats, 72-50. They met again in the Sweet 16 in 2012, with OSU winning 81-66 in Boston.
This figures to be a much more evenly matched contest. UC is coming off a 31-5 season and an American Athletic Conference championship. OSU was 25-9 in is first season under head coach Chris Holtmann last year. Both teams lost in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.
"I appreciate Coach Holtmann and their athletic director, Gene Smith, for what I would say is their forward thinking, modern thinking," Cronin said. "The game is a positive. The thing I like about playing them is we don't have hatred for each other. It's a game of basketball, with two coaches that really respect each other.
"There's no shame in losing just because you're in state. It's not like it's going to kill your recruiting. There's no gamble in it. The days of don't play anybody else in state, all that stuff's over with. The people that follow basketball and buy season tickets at both our schools deserve for us to play."
The UC players said they don't know a lot about the historical aspect of the rivalry. Cane Broome and Jarron Cumberland know only that it's been a long time the Bearcats and Buckeyes have played each other.
"I just play them like it's a regular game," Cumberland said. "You've got to play focused and be on top of the details."
Cumberland is the only UC scholarship player from Ohio. The Wilmington High School product said the Buckeyes recruited him when he was a freshman in high school. After that, he said, "They just lost interest."
Broome, from East Hartford, Conn., played against OSU when he was a freshman at Sacred Heart. It didn't go well for him and his teammates.
"They beat us by 50," Broome said. "I always remember that. I started out the game good. I hit a three and a layup and then after that they just put the dogs on us.
It was the worst loss I've ever had."
To be more precise, OSU won the game, 106-48, in Columbus on Nov. 23, 2014. Broome scored eight points in 30 minutes, went three-for-10 from the field, one-for-three from three-point range, pulled down four rebounds and committed six turnovers.
Both teams are trying to find themselves against a quality, early-season opponent. The Buckeyes lost forward Keita Bates-Diop, the Big Ten Player of the Year in 2017-18, plus forward Jae'Sean Tate and guard Kam Williams. The Bearcats lost forward Gary Clark, the AAC Player of the Year, plus swingman Jacob Evans and forward Kyle Washington.
"When you have a team that everybody's in a different seat on the bus, it takes time for them to realize there's a different level of responsibility that goes with sitting in that seat," Cronin said. "I think Ohio State is very similar in that regard.
They lost three players that played the same amount of minutes that our big three did. So you've got guys now that have to play well or their team is not going to win."
The Bearcats own a 26-game winning streak in Fifth Third Arena and have won their last 10 season openers. They haven't lost a season opener since they fell to Belmont on Nov. 9, 2007, and haven't played a team from a major conference in a season opener since they lost to Oklahoma State on Nov. 16, 2001.
"If we win this game, we'll be part of something special," Broome said.
Bill Koch covered UC athletics for 27 years – 15 at The Cincinnati Post and 12 at The Cincinnati Enquirer –before joining the staff of GoBearcats.com in January, 2015.
GoBearcats.com
CINCINNATI – The in-state rivalry, if you can all it a rivalry, dates all the way back to 1905, but includes only 10 games. Ohio State leads the series against the University of Cincinnati Bearcats, 6-4 and has won the last two games. But the Bearcats won the two that counted the most when they knocked off the Buckeyes in the national championship games of 1961 and 1962.
Now the two largest schools in Ohio, separated by roughly a 100-mile stretch of I-71, will get together again when the Buckeyes make an extremely rare appearance in Cincinnati to play the Bearcats at 6 p.m. Wednesday at Fifth Third Arena in the regular-season opener for both teams.
The occasion is the first regular-season game in the 29-year-old arena, which has been renovated at a cost of $87 million. UC will return the game next season at Schottenstein Center in Columbus.
"It's great that we're playing," UC coach Mick Cronin said Monday. "Hopefully we can play for a long time."
This will be the first time UC and Ohio State have played each other at UC since Jan. 3, 1920 when the Buckeyes posted a 35-13 win at Schmidlapp Hall. After the Bearcats posted a 33-17 win over OSU in Columbus, they've met only once during the regular season. That was during Cronin's first season at UC in 2006-07 at the Wooden Tradition in Indianapolis. The fourth-ranked Buckeyes, who played in the national title game that season, overwhelmed the depleted Bearcats, 72-50. They met again in the Sweet 16 in 2012, with OSU winning 81-66 in Boston.
This figures to be a much more evenly matched contest. UC is coming off a 31-5 season and an American Athletic Conference championship. OSU was 25-9 in is first season under head coach Chris Holtmann last year. Both teams lost in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.
"I appreciate Coach Holtmann and their athletic director, Gene Smith, for what I would say is their forward thinking, modern thinking," Cronin said. "The game is a positive. The thing I like about playing them is we don't have hatred for each other. It's a game of basketball, with two coaches that really respect each other.
"There's no shame in losing just because you're in state. It's not like it's going to kill your recruiting. There's no gamble in it. The days of don't play anybody else in state, all that stuff's over with. The people that follow basketball and buy season tickets at both our schools deserve for us to play."
The UC players said they don't know a lot about the historical aspect of the rivalry. Cane Broome and Jarron Cumberland know only that it's been a long time the Bearcats and Buckeyes have played each other.
"I just play them like it's a regular game," Cumberland said. "You've got to play focused and be on top of the details."
Cumberland is the only UC scholarship player from Ohio. The Wilmington High School product said the Buckeyes recruited him when he was a freshman in high school. After that, he said, "They just lost interest."
Broome, from East Hartford, Conn., played against OSU when he was a freshman at Sacred Heart. It didn't go well for him and his teammates.
"They beat us by 50," Broome said. "I always remember that. I started out the game good. I hit a three and a layup and then after that they just put the dogs on us.
It was the worst loss I've ever had."
To be more precise, OSU won the game, 106-48, in Columbus on Nov. 23, 2014. Broome scored eight points in 30 minutes, went three-for-10 from the field, one-for-three from three-point range, pulled down four rebounds and committed six turnovers.
Both teams are trying to find themselves against a quality, early-season opponent. The Buckeyes lost forward Keita Bates-Diop, the Big Ten Player of the Year in 2017-18, plus forward Jae'Sean Tate and guard Kam Williams. The Bearcats lost forward Gary Clark, the AAC Player of the Year, plus swingman Jacob Evans and forward Kyle Washington.
"When you have a team that everybody's in a different seat on the bus, it takes time for them to realize there's a different level of responsibility that goes with sitting in that seat," Cronin said. "I think Ohio State is very similar in that regard.
They lost three players that played the same amount of minutes that our big three did. So you've got guys now that have to play well or their team is not going to win."
The Bearcats own a 26-game winning streak in Fifth Third Arena and have won their last 10 season openers. They haven't lost a season opener since they fell to Belmont on Nov. 9, 2007, and haven't played a team from a major conference in a season opener since they lost to Oklahoma State on Nov. 16, 2001.
"If we win this game, we'll be part of something special," Broome said.
Bill Koch covered UC athletics for 27 years – 15 at The Cincinnati Post and 12 at The Cincinnati Enquirer –before joining the staff of GoBearcats.com in January, 2015.