Ohio State Buckeyes Fall to No. 7 in AP Poll

The Buckeyes lost to Michigan State and Iowa last week, marking three consecutive losses overall.

Brendan Gulick | Mar 1, 2021

Ohio State Buckeyes Fall to No. 7 in AP Poll /

The Ohio State Buckeyes are sounding all of the alarm bells, but it's certainly been a tough week.

After losing to Michigan on Sunday, Feb. 21 in an instant classic college basketball game, the Buckeyes dropped two more consecutive games this week to Michigan State and Iowa to bring their record to 18-7 on the season (12-7 in Big Ten play).

In Monday afternoon's announcement of the latest AP Top 25, Ohio State fell back three spots to No. 7. It's the first time they've regressed in the poll since the first week of January and it's the first time they've been ranked this low in one month's time.

The Buckeyes have only one game left in the regular season - a Saturday matchup with Illinois at Value City Arena. Then it's on to the Big Ten tournament next week, where Ohio State suddenly finds itself in a less favorable spot. Now in fifth place in the league standings behind Michigan, Illinois, Iowa and Purdue, the Buckeyes have fallen out of the "double-bye" for the time being. If the tournament started today, they'd have to win four games in four days to win the conference title instead of winning three games in three days.

No league in the country has the kind of depth the Big Ten this year. Yes the Big 12 is having a good season, but Ohio State is ranked seventh in the nation and fifth in its own conference.

Several other Big Ten teams were ranked again this week, including No. 2 Michigan, No. 4 Illinois, No. 5 Iowa, No. 23 Purdue and No. 25 Wisconsin.

-----

You may also like:

Instant Analysis: Ohio State Loses Third Consecutive Game, Falling to Iowa at Home

WATCH: Chris Holtmann Reacts to Ohio State Loss to Iowa

Poor First Half Dooms Buckeyes Against Iowa

Chris Holtmann Ejected at Michigan State After Two Technical Fouls

Projecting Big Ten Basketball First and Second Team All-Conference Selections

-----

Be sure to stay locked into BuckeyesNow all the time!

Join the BuckeyesNow community!
Subscribe to the BuckeyesNow YouTube channel
Follow Brendan on Twitter: @brendangulick22
Follow BuckeyesNow on Twitter: @BuckeyesNowSI
Like and follow BuckeyesNow on Facebook

Published Mar 1, 2021

BRENDAN GULICK

Brendan Gulick is the publisher for BuckeyesNow, Cleveland Baseball Insider and Cavs Insider on the FanNation Network. He is also an accomplished host and play-by-play voice on TV and radio, including on Big Ten Network and NCAA.com where he's called 45 NCAA national championships. Gulick is an update anchor and fill-in host at 92.3 The Fan in Cleveland, Ohio.