The time was running out in Ohio State's season, and their head coach didn't know how many timeouts they had left.
For as good as Ohio State's final three weeks of the season were, the end of it was equally as bad.
The Buckeyes scratched and clawed their way out of a huge 15-point hole in the first half against the TCU Horned Frogs. Fast-forwarding to the final 30 seconds, TCU executed a set play to lay the ball in to take a two-point lead with just 4.1 seconds remaining.
Ohio State called a timeout, their final one, to set up a play for their star, Bruce Thornton.
The play was hardly a play as they Thornton inbounded the basketball to Cristoph Tilly, who pitched it back to Thornton, wasting a second just getting him the ball.
Thornton dribbled it up the court and threw up a half-court heave that wasn't even close. The Buckeyes' season came to a disappointing end.
The play that they drew up felt odd, but it was only going to get worse. In the post-game press conference, head coach Jake Diebler was asked what the plan was for the play.
He responded by saying that they wanted to give Bruce Thornton the ball on the run and give him passing outlets, a shot, or the chance to call a timeout across half-court on the play.
The only problem is that the Buckeyes did not have a timeout remaining.
To give him the benefit of the doubt, there is a chance that Diebler just got caught up in the emotions of the tough loss and misspoke. There is also a chance that he gave his senior point guard the opportunity to call a timeout as time expired on his career and didn't have any timeouts remaining.
The expectations for these coaches are always moving. First, the goal is to make the tournament, then the goal is to make a run in the tournament, and then the goal moves to winning the whole thing.
Diebler had lost the fanbase almost completely before his team made its run to the tournament. Once Ohio State completed its run and solidified its spot in the tournament, he gained a lot of favor back.
All of that favor could be lost by that one simple quote that was just a boneheaded thing to say.
It's unfortunate for him because his team fought hard for him, but a mistake like that is nearly indefensible.
He made it, and now he has to live with the consequence of drawing up a bad play for his team with their season on the line and potentially giving them (very) bad coaching.
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