Getty Ohio guard Jason Preston.
The Ohio Bobcats basketball team will host the Central Michigan Chippewas in the first round of the MAC Tournament on Monday.
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The game (7 p.m. ET start time) won’t be on TV, but anyone in the U.S. can watch Ohio vs Central Michigan live on ESPN+:
ESPN+ is the digital streaming service from ESPN that has exclusive coverage of over 1,500 college basketball games this season (including all the other MAC Tournament first-round and quarterfinal games), plus other live sports every day, all the 30-for-30 documentaries, and additional original content (both video and written) all for $4.99 per month.
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Once signed up for ESPN+, you can then watch Ohio vs Central Michigan live on your computer via ESPN.com, or on your phone (Android and iPhone compatible), tablet, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, or other streaming device via the ESPN app.
Ohio vs Central Michigan Preview:
The Bobcats won three of their last four regular season tests to improve to 16-15 overall and 8-10 in MAC play, good for the tournament’s eighth seed.
On Friday, they closed their regular season finale with a 14-2 run to best the Miami RedHawks 67-65.
Ohio guard Jason Preston led all participants with 24 points and 7 assists. He shot 8-of-15 from the field and 5-of-9 from distance.
The Bobcats were without forward Ben Vander Plas, their leading rebounder and second-leading scorer, who picked up an ankle injury in the team’s Tuesday road loss to the Akron Zips.
“I think it just shows the resolve and grit and determination of our guys,” Ohio head coach Jeff Boals said, according to the school’s athletics department website. “Going into the last war, it was 59-50 with 3:47 to go. And then it was a 10-point game with 2:15 to go, and give our guys credit. They made plays when they needed to.”
He added: “To do that without Ben Vander Plas and a non-100 percent Jordan Dartis, hats off to our guys.”
Dartis, the team’s third-leading scorer and leader in 3-pointers made per game, has been dealing with a leg injury since Feb. 22. The senior guard logged just 23 minutes; he entered the night averaging 31.7 minutes per game.
Freshman guard Miles Brown played 21 minutes, his second-highest figure of the season and highest since the team’s second contest, and came up with a career-high 3 steals. He hit two free throws with about a minute and half to go to put the Bobcats up 65-63, giving them their first lead since early in the second half.
“It doesn’t matter if you start the game or come off the bench,” Brown said, according to The Post. “It’s all about how you finish.
“Today, I didn’t start the game, but I finished it, and I finished it well.”
Central Michigan, the MAC Tournament’s ninth seed, snapped a nine-game losing streak on Friday, topping the Western Michigan Broncos 85-68 at home to improve to 14-17 overall and 7-11 in conference play.
Chippewas guard Dallas Morgan scored a game-high 20 points, shooting 8-of-15 from the field and 4-of-9 from deep.
“When things don’t go well it’s easy to get your head down,” Chippewas head coach Keno Davis said, according to Central Michigan Life. “It’s easy to look ahead to next year or seniors thinking the year wasn’t what they had hoped for at one point. But the group rallied … they had a good focus of turning the page and looking for the next game.”