Ohio State's Jamison Battle downplays Minnesota rematch: 'It's another game'
Jamison Battle could smell the storyline brewing eight days and four states away. It was Saturday night and the Ohio State forward was standing near the locker room inside Raider Arena in Niceville, Florida, celebrating a season-high 21-point effort in a win against Santa Clara in the championship game of the Emerald Coast Classic.
A flight home and a Wednesday home game with Central Michigan were on the immediate horizon, but it wasn’t hard to peek a little bit beyond on the schedule to the next game looming there. In his first Big Ten game as a member of the Buckeyes, the fifth-year graduate player would get to battle with not only his hometown university but the one he called home for the previous two years: Minnesota.
“I think that’s going to be the narrative: ‘Oh, it’s Jamison Battle versus Minnesota,’ ” he told The Dispatch on Nov. 25. “That’s obviously going to be a narrative, but I’m not too worried about it. Obviously I went there for two years, graduated from there, it’s home, but it’s another game. I’m not going to look at it any different.”
Now, having handed the Chippewas a 27-point defeat, that game is neigh. When he takes the court inside his new home Sunday evening, he’ll be facing a maroon-and-gold reminder of where he’s from and where he’s been. A native of Robbinsdale, Minnesota, he prepped at DeLaSalle, located two miles from Minnesota’s Williams Arena.
Prior to Friday’s practice, Battle repeated that he’s trying to keep the main thing the main thing.
“You obviously have thoughts about that but it’s just first Big Ten game of the season,” he said. “That’s how we’re looking at it. As a team we’ve got things we need to improve on and we’re really looking forward to opening the Big Ten season at home and then playing a pretty solid Minnesota team.”
In two seasons with the Golden Gophers, Battle averaged 15.1 points and 5.1 rebounds while shooting 33.9% on 7.1 3-point attempts a game. When 2022-23 came to a close, Battle began to mentally transition into a professional career when it became clear that he had unfinished business at the collegiate level and a personal resume that needed some polishing. Instead of professionalizing, then, Battle entered the transfer portal.
Ohio State quickly got in touch, the two sides met and Battle became a Buckeye with an eye on reaching the NCAA Tournament for the first time in his career. At Big Ten media day, ironically located in Minneapolis, site of this year’s conference tournament, Battle was one of three Ohio State representatives.
As he did then, Battle called the Golden Gophers his brothers when he spoke with reporters Friday and said he keeps up with several of them.
“A big guy is Parker Fox,” he said. “Watching him play coming off of two ACLs is really cool to me because I’ve seen him grind those out and I’ve seen him be at rehab every day. Guys like Isaiah Ihnen, another guy who I’m really tight with. Dawson (Garcia) as well. Isaiah was another guy who had back-to-back ACL tears so seeing those guys be successful and seeing those guys work through that, it’s special because of how much time and effort they had to put in.”
Wednesday, Buckeyes coach Chris Holtmann said he wasn’t worried about Battle’s approach to the game. He’s one of four players to transfer to Ohio State from another Big Ten school during Holtmann’s tenure, joining predecessors Andrew Dakich (Michigan) and Jamari Wheeler (Penn State) in addition to current teammate Evan Mahaffey (also Penn State).
“Every conversation I’ve ever had with him, he speaks really highly of the program and the coaches and the players,” the coach said. “We know this is a part of college basketball. We’re not the only ones who have interconference transfers. There will be an emotional element for him that he’ll have to keep in mind.”
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Minnesota went 22-39 during Battle’s two seasons and 6-33 in league play. One of those six wins came at Value City Arena last season, when the Gophers handed the Buckeyes a 70-67 defeat that marked Minnesota’s only win during its 15 games in January and February. It was a low point in a season with plenty for Ohio State, the lowest-ranked loss according to KenPom.com in the Holtmann era (Minnesota was ranked No. 193) and Battle had 11 points.
It also ended with a controversial foul call, one that saw Ohio State’s Bruce Thornton called for one with 1.7 seconds left after he appeared to cleanly block Ta’Lon Cooper at the rim with the score tied at 67. Instead, Thornton was called for a foul and the Gophers would finish by hitting three free throws to set the final score.
He was on one side last season and the other one this year. In Battle’s eyes, was it a foul or no?
“I mean, the refs made the call,” he said. “I’m not gonna say too much about that … it was exciting to get a Big Ten win on the road but times have changed now. We’ve got to go out here and get this win at home.”
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Minnesota rematch just 'another game' Ohio State's Jamison Battle says
