INDIANAPOLIS - Nobody considered asking the driver to fire up the team bus outside Conseco Fieldhouse last night for the long ride home to Columbus.
Wisconsin had pushed the Ohio State women's basketball team to the edge of the cliff so many times in a semifinal of the Big Ten tournament that the Buckeyes could count the pebbles at the bottom. Instead of falling, they rallied in the final minutes to an 82-73 victory.
"I never thought we were going to lose," Ohio State center Jantel Lavender said. "I had this feeling we were going to pull it out because I think we were playing too hard. Sammy (Prahalis) had too much emotion for us to lose. I think I had too much emotion for us to lose."
Top-seeded Ohio State (29-4) trailed Wisconsin (21-10) for much of the game but made enough stops at the end to withstand another night in the conference buzz saw.
"Everybody was closing down on defense for the last eight minutes," Lavender said. "When I saw we were doing that, I knew we weren't going to lose."
During the comeback, Prahalis and Lavender more than lived up to their first-team all-Big Ten stature. They attacked and dominated. Prahalis' 29-point game included an 11-of-11 showing at the free-throw line. Lavender chipped in 27 points. She made 13 of 16 free throws.
"We're here to win," Prahalis said. "I kept thinking, 'I'm not going to lose this game. I'm not going home. We can't go home.' It was just not an option for us. In every huddle, everybody was focused. Everybody was into it."
The Buckeyes had to raise their game because the fourth-seeded Badgers played high-level basketball. Junior guard Alyssa Karel scored a career-high 31 points and was five for five from beyond the three-point arc.
When Ohio State finally took the lead in the second half at 62-60 on a three-pointer by Prahalis, Karel answered with a basket. She hit a three-pointer with 6:47 to play to give Wisconsin a 67-65 lead.
Tayler Hill, who scored 14 points for Ohio State, tied the score again with two of her eight free throws. Karel matched those with 5:58 remaining, but that would be the final Wisconsin lead.
"We figured out that they couldn't guard us off the dribble," Hill said. "If they were guarding us for a three, we just attacked. We attacked every time we had a chance."
Free throws by the ton followed. The Buckeyes set a tournament record, making 34 of 38 free throws.
"Free throws are big down the stretch," Hill said. "If we had missed half of our free throws, it would have been a different story."
Prahalis and Lavender fairly boiled down the stretch until a three-point play by Prahalis with 1:42 on the clock settled matters. Coach Jim Foster said that none of his previous Buckeyes teams could match the emotion.
"It's not even close," he said. "A lot more. A lot more passion, a lot more fire, a lot more juice, a lot more fun. All of the above."
The Buckeyes play third-seeded Iowa (19-12) in the championship game at 4:30 p.m. today.
jmassie@dispatch.com