Chris Holtmann is focused on leading Ohio State back to the top of the Big Ten. After finishing 16-19 a year ago, the Buckeyes are eyeing a significant turnaround in 2023-24. I caught up with Holtmann this week to discuss last season’s struggles, Ohio State’s newcomers, and much more.
Jon Rothstein: You’ve been a head coach for 12 years. Have you ever went through a season as challenging as the one that you went through a year ago?
Chris Holtmann: No, definitely not. Early on when I was at Gardner Webb, the first couple of years were a challenge. We started to turn the corner there, but it’s different when you really experience a challenging year like we did last season in the Big Ten.
Rothstein: Now even though you finished 16-19 last season, you had a surge late and won three games in the Big Ten Tournament before losing in the semifinals to Purdue. What changed for your team during that week?
Holtmann: I think it went back a little further than that because we went 5-2 down the stretch. I think we started to see it turn for us a little bit in the game against Purdue at Purdue even though we got blown out in the second half. I think we started to see some things that were really good. Our young kids performed at a high level and we were reliant on them — probably too reliant for their own good, but they responded and played well as did a lot of our older guys. I think we played through Bruce (Thornton) a little bit more and generally played better basketball. I think it was the last 4-5 weeks of the season where we really started to see it. The last four weeks of the year was the best that we played all year — there was no question about that. And we beat good teams. Wisconsin was a really good team and I think the other teams that we beat were NCAA Tournament teams. We feel good about that, but certainly you look back on the season as a whole and you wish you did better. But finishing like that was certainly a positive thing.
Rothstein: That same Purdue team that you referenced won both the Big Ten regular season and tournament titles and was a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament before losing to Fairleigh Dickinson. The Big Ten has had 26 teams reach the last three NCAA Tournaments and only four of those teams have reached the Sweet 16. Why hasn’t the league performed better in March?
Holtmann: I don’t think you can question the depth of this league. That’s what has gotten conflated a little but with the lack of success that the Big Ten has had in the NCAA Tournament as of late. But if you go back and look at the Final Fours of the last 10 years and where the Big Ten is compared to the other leagues, I think we’re first or second in terms of the amount of teams that have participated. You can certainly look at the past five years and make some arguments — I think that can get twisted however you want it to. The reality is as a league, we have to own the fact that during the last few years we haven’t performed quite as well as many of us hoped. I think it’s only a matter of time. There’s too many good teams. There’s too many good players. There’s too many good coaches. I’ve said it all along — it’s the deepest league in the country. It’s certainly the deepest league that I’ve been a part of, but you can also say that we wish the league has performed better in March recently.
Rothstein: You’ve added major reinforcements through the transfer portal for Ohio State and also added a talented freshman class. Which of those newcomers will make the biggest impact for the Buckeyes during the upcoming year?
Holtmann: Time will tell. We certainly need scoring at the wing spot. We lost some scoring with Brice (Sensabaugh) and Justice (Sueing). We weren’t planning on losing Brice after one year so we knew that we needed to get a transfer. I think all three of our transfers — Jamison Battle (Minnesota), Dale Bonner (Baylor), and Evan Mahaffey (Penn State) — will play an important role. This league understands that Jamison (Battle) is very capable of scoring the ball. He’s got to get better at rebounding and some other areas, but probably because we needed scoring we’d look to him first.
Rothstein: What’s the biggest reason why Ohio State will be significantly better than it was a year ago?
Holtmann: I think you begin with the fact that we have a returning core that we haven’t had. When we took over, we had a returning core. After that, we had a returning core with C.J. Walker, Duane Washington, and the Wessons. I think it was five years in a row that we were ranked in the top 15 in the country. That’s typically because you’re returning a core of guys. Even though those cores were probably older than this group is, this group does carry some experience from last year with Bruce (Thornton), Roddy Gayle, Felix Okpara, and Zed Key now being healthy. I think we all ask ourselves about continuity in this day and age. I think for us that solid continuity is something that we really need. Now, all of those guys have to take a step. We need Roddy (Gayle) to be consistently better and I believe he will. We don’t need him to be as good as he was in the Big Ten Tournament every game, but we do need him to be better. I think it always begins there. We have a lot more known commodities than we had at this time last year and typically when we’ve been good here, we’ve had some known commodities.
