INDIANAPOLIS –– Ohio State picked up just what the doctor ordered on Thursday, a win to end its four-game skid and a berth in the Big Ten Tournament quarterfinals after a 79-75 result against Minnesota at Lucas Oil Stadium.

The final score was much closer than the game seemed for most of its duration, as No. 13 seed Minnesota stormed back from a double-digit deficit to get within one point of the Buckeyes in the final few seconds.

Ohio State held strong though, closing out its first win since Feb. 18 as it moves on to face Purdue in the next round of the conference tournament on Friday afternoon.

Before we look ahead to that matchup though, let’s take a look at some of the most revealing statistics from Thursday’s contest.

Any Big Ten team would be happy with a double-digit lead at halftime of a conference tournament game, but given how poorly Minnesota shot the ball on Thursday, 12 points just didn’t seem like enough of an advantage for Ohio State.

The Buckeyes went into intermission ahead 39-27, having shot a sizzling 55 percent from the field and 50 percent from beyond the 3-point arc. Four different scorers notched at least seven points in the period, and Ohio State’s offensive mojo seemed to be back.

On the other side, Minnesota guards Marcus Carr and Jamal Mashburn Jr. combined to shoot 4-for-22 as the team shot 9-for-36 as a whole.

So how were the Gophers still within relative striking distance after such a statistically one-sided half?

Well, the Buckeyes committed eight turnovers in the first 20 minutes, including four in a three-minute stretch in which Minnesota strung together a couple buckets to stay in it.

As the Gophers proved late in the second half, and even in their Round One win over Northwestern on Wednesday, March basketball doesn’t always have to look pretty, and some ugly circumstances might even favor a scrappy team like Minnesota.

Ohio State had a comfortable 12-point lead with 98 seconds to play in Indianapolis, so naturally most assumed the game was well in-hand for the Scarlet and Gray.

The Gophers challenged that hypothesis, and nearly stole a win from the fifth-seeded Buckeyes with a furious late-game comeback that eventually cut the Ohio State lead to just one point with 13 seconds remaining.

Unlike in recent losses though, the Minnesota run did not come off the back of an ice-cold shooting stretch for the Buckeyes.

Instead, the Gophers’ success came in winning each possession, fouling the Buckeyes and hitting big baskets on the other end to inch ever closer.

The Buckeyes didn’t attempt a single field goal in the final 78 seconds of the game, while the Gophers shot eight, and made five of them.

Ohio State forward Justice Sueing missed three free throws and guards Duane Washington and CJ Walker each committed critical turnovers to allow Minnesota some daylight, and the Gophers even had the ball with a chance to tie the game with just six seconds left.

However, the Buckeyes sent Carr to the free throw line to avoid a game-tying triple, and Washington iced the game from the charity stripe to finally close things out.

Ohio State leading scorers E.J. Liddell and Duane Washington did the bulk of the leg work when it comes to putting points on the board in the final four games to close out the Big Ten regular season.

That may not seem like a bad thing on its own, but one of the calling cards of Ohio State’s success for long stretches this season had been the diversity of its offensive contributions.

The Buckeyes may have lost that during their four-game skid, but they found it again on Thursday, as five different Buckeyes scored in double figures.

Ohio State players not named Liddell or Washington scored 49 of Ohio State’s 79 points, making up 62 percent of the offensive production while the aforementioned pair still combined for their customary 30 points.

CJ Walker, Kyle Young and Musa Jallow, a group that includes two non-starters and none of the Buckeyes’ top three scorers this season, combined to score 29 points on an impressive 11-for-17 shooting.

Despite letting the Gophers back in the game late, Ohio State’s offense returned to form in many ways on Thursday, which bodes well for the Buckeyes’ chances moving forward.