Chris Holtmann previews possible changes to Ohio State's starting lineup

Ohio State snapped their five-game losing streak on Saturday with a dominant win over Iowa, defeating the Hawkeyes 93-77. Buckeyes head coach Chris Holtmann made some adjustments to his starting lineup before the game, which ended up paying off for Ohio State, but will he sick those adjustments heading into their next matchup on the road versus Illinois on Tuesday?

“Yeah we’ll continue to look at it Adam I think I like the balance it gives our lineup right now in terms of, just to your point, some of the really talented wing players that we have in this league and the ability to guard those guys,” Holtmann said.

Holtmann decided to start first-year Oklahoma State transfer Isaac Likekele and freshman Roddy Gayle against Iowa. Gayle was efficient in his first career start, scoring 9 points on 57.1% shooting from the field, but the decision to start Likekele was crucial in the Buckeyes victory.

Likekele spent the previous four seasons of his career with Oklahoma State and started the first eight games of the season for Ohio State. He missed three games due to a personal matter, and in the Buckeyes’ last seven games had only made one start prior to Saturday. He made the most of his opportunity versus Iowa, scoring a season-high 18 points and recording his first double-double as a Buckeye with 10 rebounds, also adding seven assists to his impressive performance.

“So I like the balance it gives our team defensively and offensively, but we have multiple guys that can and will start, so we’ll decide that here in the next 24 hours,” Holtmann said.

While Ohio State’s new starting lineup proved it can work, it did force seniors Justice Sueing and Sean McNeil to come off of the bench for the first time of the season, which Holtmann also discussed.

“Sometimes it’s really good to see it Adam and to take stock of it,” Holtmann said. “Whether players want to do it or not is a different story, but sometimes it does really give them the abilities to just kind of sit back, see the game, take a deep breath, relax and I thought he did some really good things.”

Sueing and McNeil are the Buckeyes’ second and fourth leading scorers on the team and veteran players, but the results of the lineup change are also hard to deny. It will definitely be interesting to see what decision Holtmann makes for their next game versus Illinois on Tuesday, especially considering they’ll be facing the Big Ten’s fifth-leading scorer in Terrence Shannon.