Brommer Blossoms against No. 1 Buckeyes

Stats | Boxscore

Jan. 19, 2011

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COLUMBUS, Ohio — Andrew Brommer gave the University of Iowa a top-ranked effort Wednesday, but it wasn’t enough as No. 1 Ohio State defended its home court, 70-48, in Big Ten Conference men’s basketball at Value City Arena.

The active Brommer played a career-high 30 minutes. He scored 12 points with six rebounds and three blocked shots — all team highs. Point guard Bryce Cartwright handed out seven assists.

“It’s all about effort. If you give a good effort you’ve got a chance,” Brommer said. “We just need to get on the boards and get those 50-50 balls and if we do that we’ll be all right.”

“I’m really proud of Andrew,” UI head coach Fran McCaffery said. “We’ve seen him play this way in practice, we’ve seen him play this way in games. This is an indication of what he’s capable of doing and up until the last minute, he’s blocking shots at the top of the square. That’s a real positive for our team.”

It is the first game for Ohio State as the nation’s top-ranked team. The Buckeyes made 26 of 55 field goals (47.3 percent) and scored 20 points off 23 turnovers to improve to 19-0 overall, 6-0 in the Big Ten; Iowa is 7-11, 0-6.

The Hawkeyes held edges in bench points (19 to 12), points in the paint (36 to 34) and fast break points (10 to 8). Brommer led the way for Iowa with 12 points and he was followed in double figures by Melsahn Basabe (11) and Cartwright (10).

Ohio State led 40-23 after a first half that saw the Hawkeyes shoot 35.7 percent from the field (10 of 28). Iowa picked that up in the second half, making 12 of 27 shots from the field (44.4).

“Ohio State has a lot of weapons but I felt that our energy level was not what it needed to be,” McCaffery said. “We were a little bit tentative. Our defense was not what it needed to be — our intensity level, ball pressure, all of those things were a little less than we needed.”

The Hawkeyes return to Carver-Hawkeye Arena to host Indiana on Sunday with a 2:05 p.m. tipoff.

“I think we need to get back home. We need to regroup,” McCaffery said. “We’re looking forward to Sunday’s game; we have some work to do between now and then.”