Colgate Raiders at Ohio State Buckeyes

Russell, Loving lead No. 14 Buckeyes, 70-50

D'Angelo Russell scored 14 of his 19 points in the second half and Marc Loving added 17 points to lead No. 14 Ohio State to a 70-50 victory over Colgate on Saturday night.

The Buckeyes (6-1) lost at No. 5 Louisville 64-55 in their last outing in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge on Tuesday night.

Not until Williams, who chipped in with 11 points, capped an 11-0 surge with a four-point play with 5:03 left did Ohio State finally put the game away.

"Some games, I hate to say it, but some people need to get picked up," said Williams, a redshirt freshman who was a prolific scorer in high school in Baltimore. "You need your teammates to pick you up when you're in a slump. That's what we have going for us right now. When anyone's in a little slump, we're a close enough team that we can get them out of it."

The Buckeyes led 31-21 after an uneven first half in which their lone threat on offense was Loving, who before missing his final 3-pointer was 3 for 3 from the field, 2 for 2 behind the arc and 4 for 4 at the line for 12 points.

Ohio State broke out to a 10-0 lead, then quickly cooled and led just 23-19 before running off the next eight points.

The Raiders (1-7) wouldn't go away in the second half, hanging within 10 points most of the way.

"You can't give teams like Colgate an opportunity to linger around because then you'll be in a dogfight," Loving said. "We knew we had to go on a run eventually."

He scored and Williams' hit a 3-pointer and was fouled, then made the free throw, to push the lead to 66-46.

"When Kameron Williams knocks down shots, he's very valuable to us," said Ohio State assistant Jeff Boals, who did postgame interviews in place of head coach Thad Matta. Matta sat on a high stool near the bench to help alleviate back pain and had spasms afterward.

Ethan Jacobs had 18 points, Damon Sherman-Newsome scored 12 and Austin Tillotson had 11 for Colgate, which has lost five in a row.

All seven losses have come by seven or fewer points.

"That's kind of what our guys have come to expect, for us to be in all of those games, to compete with whoever it is that we're playing," said coach Matt Langel.

OBLONG BALL: The crowd was announced as 14,054. The game tipped off 3 1/2 hours before the Buckeyes football team took on Wisconsin in the Big Ten championship game in Indianapolis. A large contingent of Ohio State fans was on hand.

QUOTE OF THE GAME: Langel blamed his team's nervousness at the start for a quick 10-0 deficit: "The bright lights and the big stars, it shocked us for a couple of minutes and we weren't ready to go. Then we kind of got our legs underneath us."

TIP-INS:

Colgate: The Raiders return four starters and 14 letter winners from a 13-18 club, but are still struggling because of the close losses. One culprit is shoddy ball handling; they were averaging four more turnovers a game than they were forcing. Against the Buckeyes they had 15 which led to 19 points.

Ohio State: The Buckeyes went into the Louisville game second in the nation in field-goal percentage at .567, but made just 17 of 56 shots (.333) against the Cardinals. Playing at home against a team that was holding opponents to 44.4 percent shooting from the field, the Buckeyes misfired early. But they bounced back in the second half to shoot 59 percent and finished at 47 percent for the game (27 of 58).

UP NEXT

Colgate: The Raiders return home for two games against Morrisville State on Tuesday and Binghamton on Thursday.

Ohio State: The Buckeyes get back in action on Wednesday at home against High Point.

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Follow Rusty Miller on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/RustyMillerAP

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