COLUMBUS — Ohio State is returning to Madison Square Garden for the CBS Sports Classic. The Buckeyes will play in MSG for the second time in three years when they make the trip to New York City for a Dec. 21 date with Kentucky.
UCLA and North Carolina will kick things off at 3 p.m., and then Ohio State and Kentucky will follow. The event will be broadcast on CBS and available to stream on Paramount+.
The 2022 season marks the only other time MSG hosted the CBS Sports Classic. The Garden pulled in a sold-out crowd of more than 20,000. They saw UNC come back to beat Ohio State in overtime and UCLA take down Kentucky afterward.
Seven venues have held the four-team event since it began in 2014: MSG (2022, 2024), the United Center in Chicago (2014, 2018), the Barclays Center in Brooklyn (2015), T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas (2016, 2019, 2021), Smoothie King Center in New Orleans (2017), Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse in Cleveland (2020) and State Farm Arena in Atlanta (2023).
The same four teams participate in the annual event: UCLA, UNC, Ohio State and Kentucky. Here are their records in the CBS Sports Classic over the last 10 years:
- UCLA: 3-6
- UNC: 6-4
- Ohio State: 5-4
- Kentucky: 5-5
All four programs rank in the top six in all-time Final Four berths. UNC has 21, UCLA has 18, Kentucky has 17 and Ohio State has 10. That said, 2023-24 wasn’t a banner year for the quartet. UCLA and Ohio State missed the NCAA Tournament. Kentucky suffered a first-round upset to 14th-seeded Oakland. And UNC — despite earning a top overall seed in The Dance — bowed out to Alabama in the Sweet 16.
Both Ohio State and Kentucky are now led by new head coaches.
Jake Diebler became the Buckeyes’ interim head coach after Chris Holtmann’s midseason firing and then earned the full-time promotion before a mini NIT run. Meanwhile, John Calipari left Kentucky to take the Arkansas job, and the Wildcats hired former BYU head coach Mark Pope to replace him.
Ohio State will notably open the season against another SEC team, Texas. The Buckeyes will face the Longhorns in Las Vegas for the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame Series on Nov. 4 in T-Mobile Arena.
It will be part of College Basketball’s Opening Night 2024, an event that will also feature a highly-anticipated women’s basketball showdown between defending national champion South Carolina and Michigan that same night in Vegas.
Also, Ohio State will complete its home-and-home series with Texas A&M this season. The Buckeyes hosted the Aggies last fall and this time are headed to College Station on Nov. 15, according to CBS Sports Insider Jon Rothstein.
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