Ohio State women’s basketball takes care of Minnesota, women’s gymnastics with two Big Ten upsets

The Bucs weren’t the only Bucks (I know...I’m sorry) to snag a W over the weekend. In fact, there are five Ohio State teams to celebrate on this fine Monday evening.

First and most recently, the Ohio State men’s basketball team jumped to No. 4 in the AP Top 25 Poll released this afternoon. This comes after their 89-85 victory over the then-No. 8 Iowa Hawkeyes on Thursday. The Buckeyes have won seven of their last eight games, and will be looking to add another conference win tonight when they play Maryland (10-9) at 9:00 p.m. ET on FS1.

Right down the hall, the Ohio State women’s basketball team beat Minnesota handily with a final score of 83-59 on Sunday afternoon.

Forwards Dorka Juhasz and Aaliyah Patty each recorded a double-double, with Juhasz recording a game-high 18 points along with 10 rebounds, and Patty finishing with 14 points and 10 rebounds. Sophomore Jacy Sheldon scored 17 points to go with a team-high four assists, and guards Madison Greene and Kateri Poole contributed eight points each. The Buckeyes forced a season-high 25 turnovers and scored 27 points as a result.

The team is now 12-2 on the season and 8-2 in the conference while Minnesota falls to 5-9 and 4-8. Next up, the Buckeyes will head to Wisconsin this Wednesday to take on the Badgers for the first and only time this season at 7 p.m. ET on BTN Plus+.

The Ohio State Wrestling team’s weekend in West Lafayette, Ind. started off poorly with a 33-14 loss at the hands of the No. 1 Hawkeyes.

Then they picked themselves up, dusted themselves off and ended the day with a 23-12 win over the No. 27 Purdue Boilermakers.

Sophomore Sammy Sasso and junior Ethan Smith both ended the day 2-0. Sasso pinned No. 5 Max Murin of Iowa before dominating Purdue’s Trey Kruse in a 22-7 technical fall. Sasso remains unbeaten this season.

Smith beat Iowa’s Joey Kelly in a 18-3 tech fall of his own, followed by claiming a major decision over Purdue’s Gerrit Nijenhuis 15-5.

Ohio State is now 5-2 on the season, and will look to make it 6 as they take on TTUN this Friday in Ann Arbor.

Over in the French Field House, the Ohio State men’s and women’s fencing teams finished Day 2 of the OSU Invitational with nine team wins. The men (4-0) and women (5-1) both beat Air Force, NJIT and North Carolina. The men’s team also beat Penn State, and the women beat Temple and Denison with their sole loss coming at the hands of the Nittany Lions.

Last but not least, the women’s gymnastic team (3-3, 3-2 Big Ten) upset two ranked Big Ten opponents in their 2021 home opener to the tune of a season-high 196.375 to win. No. 20 Illinois finished second (196.075) and No. 17 Michigan State finished third (194.500).

The Buckeyes claimed event titles on bars (49.300), beam (49.175) and floor (49.200), all of which are season-high scores. Senior Jenna Swartzentruber led the team on bars and matched her career high with a 9.925. Sophomore Ella Hodges tied her season high for first place on beam with a score of 9.875. And Claire Gagliardi also matched her career high to earn the floor title with a score of 9.925, which ultimately solidified the Buckeyes’ victory over the Illini. Next up, Ohio State will hit the road to face Rutgers on Feb. 14 at 1 p.m. ET.

Now excuse me while I watch these highlight videos 4,000 times.