The Ohio State men’s basketball program has a more difficult road than ever to reach the NCAA Tournament in an expanded 18-team Big Ten. Can the Buckeyes get back to the Big Dance in 2025?
OSU hoops followers and Ohio sports betting customers have been on the edge for months regarding that question, as the Buckeyes are 15-12 overall, 7-9 in the league.
At BetOhio.com, we explore the possibilities and assign odds for whether Ohio State will make its first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2022.
Percentage Chance | Odds | |
Yes | 73.3% | -275 |
No | 26.7% | +275 |
These odds are offered solely at BetOhio.com, where we cover college sports and their pro counterparts as well as giving you the best Ohio sportsbook promo codes when you sign up with an operator.
Ohio State, befitting a team on the March Madness bubble, has had an up-and-down season. Thursday was perhaps the low point, with the Buckeyes getting blown out at home, 70-49, by Northwestern.
OSU has long since fallen out of the race for the Big Ten regular-season championship. At BetMGM Ohio Sportsbook, Michigan has -110 odds on Michigan to win the regular-season league title, compared to +180 for Michigan State and +500 for Wisconsin.
The two best wins for the Buckeyes remain an 85-65 rout of Kentucky on Dec. 21 at Madison Square Garden in New York and a 73-70 stunner at Purdue on Jan. 21. The Boilermakers are ranked No. 13 in the current Associated Press poll and the Wildcats are No. 17.
The bad news is, the Buckeyes are 0-5 against the other currently ranked opponents that they have played: Texas A&M, Maryland, Auburn, Michigan State and Wisconsin. According to stats.ncaa.org, Ohio State is 5-7 in Quad 1 games.
Worse news came in Thursday's loss to the unfancied Wildcats. OSU’s NCAA NET ranking fell to No. 32 with that defeat. According to those NET ratings, Northwestern is the second-worst opponent that the Buckeyes have lost to this season, at No. 55. Indiana, which defeated OSU in Columbus on Jan. 17, is 62nd.
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The bracketmatrix.com website complies dozens of bracket projections from various sources and averages them to see where various teams stand in the big picture as far as qualifying for the NCAA Tournament.
As of Feb. 20, Ohio State is listed as a No. 10 seed, with wildly diverging projections. Among the 108 bracket projections currently aggregated at the website, the Buckeyes are as high as a No. 8 seed and as low as a No. 11 – then there is one projection that omit OSU entirely. ESPN's Joe Lunardi released a new Bracketology on Friday morning with Ohio State falling to a No. 10 seed from his previous projections. That's perilously close to "last four byes" territory in his estimation.
Our board still gives OSU a 73.3% chance of making the field (-275 odds) against a 26.7% chance (+275) that the squad misses out. There are a few weeks before Selection Sunday on March 16 and Coach Jake Diebler’s team has three current Quad 1 opponents ahead, including a meeting at 3:45 p.m. Eastern on Sunday at UCLA (CBS).
OSU’s odds of winning the national title are +30000 at Caesars Ohio Sportsbook as of Feb. 21.
USA Today photo by Joseph Maiorana
Author
Ohio native Jim Tomlin has 30 years of experience in journalism, mostly in sports. He lends his expertise to BetOhio.com as a writer and editor after previous experience at the Tampa Bay Times, FanRag, Saturday Down South and Saturday Tradition.
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