At this point in the college basketball tournament a few things ARE certain.

“I mean you’re going to see a lot of ridiculous basketball.”

Dunks, sticky defense, blocked shots, fast breaks, rainbow three pointers, Kentucky coach John Calipari says its all part of the college game. All part of the excitement. Remember the last time Ohio State played this deep into the tournament. The 2007 trip to the Final Four hinged on a last second shot.

Knowing a tightly contested game this week-end could be decided by a shot in the final seconds, all four head coaches want as much shooting practice as possible before Saturday night tip-offs. Louisville coach Rick Pitino.

“Just make sure you get used to the dome.”
Borgerding: What is that practice in the dome is so important?
Pitino: “You know, it is depth perception, no question about it. Its the wide open space. But, its something that you just need to get a little practice in, get used to, and then I think you’ll feel comfortable in it.”

Louisville plays Kentucky in its semi-final. Kansas coach Bill Self and Ohio State coach Thad Matta say they too will take most of the allotted court time for shooting practice so players can get used to the dome before the teams face each other in the late game on Saturday.

“I think its a factor, I think sometimes coaches can make too much out of it, like altitude or something like that. You know, but it is different and I do think you have to get used to it.” Self says.

“You know we’ll get to work out down there on Friday. Get a game day shoot-around on Saturday and y’know you hope for the best.” Matta says.

Matta says the game against Kansas will be the team’s first in a dome.

Those CBS highlights we heard earlier are music to the ears of basketball analyst and former Ohio State player, Clark Kellogg. He says the arena and surroundings are definitely a factor.

Kellogg says for a player, getting used to a dome is much like getting used to a playground court.

“Some courts have nets, some have bent rims, some have rough spots, you just have to deal with it.” Says Kellogg.

And, Kellogg adds with only seconds on the clock and the game on the line, most players want the ball. He says the players who block out distractions or thoughts about what can go wrong are usually the most sucessful.

“So, as a player, you want to have chances like that and typically the most confident and free-flowing players are the ones that come through.” Kellogg says.

Ohio State this week-end will try to win its second national championship in men’s basketball. But, it will have to beat Kansas and the winner of the Kentucky, Louisville game to bring home the trophy.

“The one thing I would like to do at some point is take a deep breath and take five minutes and look around, and enjoy. Be it on the plane ride down, look back at the plane and see the players back there and grasp completely where they’ve put us at this point in the season.”

Ohio State plays Kansas in a national semi-final on Saturday. Its OSU’s third trip to the Final Four since 1999.

Matta says he took nothing for granted this year even as the team shared the Big Ten title and won games over Duke and Florida.

“I’ll be honest with you, I realized the team could reach the Final Four when there was 1.6 seconds to go and we were up by seven and Syracuse had the ball out of bounds. Because you can’t take anything for granted in today’s day and age.”

Ohio State defeated Syracuse to win its 11th trip overall to the Final Four.

Eight teams competed in Nationwide Arena during second-and-third round NCAA tournament games on Friday and Sunday. The influx of teams and fans means big bucks for local hotels, restaurants and other business that rely on tourism dollars.

For more on what these kinds of events mean to central Ohio, WOSU’s Steve Brown went to Nationwide to talk with Bruce Wimbish from the Greater Columbus Sports Commission. Click the play button above to hear their conversation.

John Diebler and the top-ranked Ohio State Buckeyes head into the tournament as the favorite to win their first national championship since 1960. They’re 32-2 and hold the tournament’s No. 1 overall seed. They play Texas – San Antonio in the first round tonight, but many people are looking past that. Way past that, to the Final Four in Houston next month.

“This team has a lot of chemistry on and off the court, and I think that’s taken them a long way,” Bob Baptist said.

Baptist covers OSU hoops for the Columbus Dispatch. And he’s right: the team does have a lot of chemistry. It showed during a press conference this week when Baptist asked already-graduated forward Dallas Lauderdale about a ping-pong class he’s taking to stay eligible for the basketball team.

Lauderdale: “I’m enrolled in that.” Baptist: “How many hours is that?” Dallas: “I don’t know, enough to keep me able to play.” (laughter) John Diebler: “Dallas’ ping-pong isn’t where it needs to be in the locker room.” (laughter) Dallas: “The thing is, I have to work on my forehand. My backhand is killer, but my forehand isn’t too good.” (more laughter)

All joking aside, most people who cover the team say cohesiveness is the team’s biggest asset. That’s credited largely to the three senior starters – Diebler, Lauderdale and guard David Lighty – who’ve seen the team go from not playing in the tournament at all three years ago, to a first-round loss in 2009, to making the round of 16 last year.

“Losing in the first round, knowing how that felt, knowing we had a chance to put that game away and win it to advance propelled us to the next year and gave us motivation to get to the Sweet 16,” Lighty said. “And now we know we had a good chance to win that game and advance.”

And last year the Buckeyes did not have all-world freshman and national player of the year candidate Jared Sullinger.

While players say they are not looking too far ahead, fans are a little more quick to make predictions. At OSU’s main rec center, third-year student Jack Andrews is confident.

“I’m excited. They definitely have the best chance that I’ve seen in a long time,” Andrews said. “I’m really excited about Sullinger, and also all the experience with David Lighty and John Diebler. I picked them in my bracket; I think we’re going to win.”

Head Coach Thad Matta isn’t quite as confident, and for good reason: he was an assistant on the 1996 Western Carolina team that nearly shocked No. 1 seed Purdue in the first round that year. But he thinks he’s put this OSU team in a good position.

“Everything that we’ve seen throughout 34 games this year, we feel confident there’s nothing we can see that we haven’t seen before. We’re getting back to as much of the basics that we can, but knowing that at this juncture of this season you have to have trust and faith that guys will adjust on the fly,” Matta said.

Baptist sits somewhere between Matta and the fans.

“It’s one of those on-any-given-night type things, because if you catch Ohio State on a night when Diebler and Buford are making their jump shots, I don’t think anybody in the country can beat them,” Baptist said. “But if they’re cold from the field from outside, there are a lot of teams in the country that can beat them.”

One thing that might help OSU stay warm: tonight’s game is just a couple hours north of the Columbus campus, inside Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland.