On Monday night, the Minnesota Golden Gophers suffered their latest setback in conference play, losing to the Ohio State Buckeyes 89-88 in double overtime. It was another frustrating loss for the Gophers and it was to this point arguably the most avoidable loss.

44.4%.

That's what the Golden Gophers shot from the free-throw line on Monday night. A Big Ten team shot 44.4% from the free throw. It's completely unacceptable. If the Gophers were a strong free-throw shooting team and it was just an off night, it would be understandable. However, the Gophers under head coach Ben Johnson have consistently struggled at one of the most fundamental aspects of the game.

Over Johnson's tenure as the Gophers head coach, the Gophers have shot 71.8%, 61.9%, 69.0%, and 61.8% from the line. Their 71.8% free-throw percentage in 2021 ranked 167th in the country. Since then they've ranked 363, 296, 360. There are 364 Division I programs.

Perhaps what was even more frustrating for the Gophers is that they had a decent stretch in December at the line. In five games, they were shooting 74.4% from the charity stripe. In their two Big Ten games this month, they're now 19-for-43, a 44.1% free throw percentage.

It's simply hard to win your games when you can't make your free throws. An even marginally better night at the free throw line and the discussion of last night's game would be much different.

It was one of Dawson Garcia's worst games of the season on Monday night, shooting 2-for-9 from the floor while also going 0-for-3 at the free-throw line. It's the third time this season, Garcia has been kept under 10 points, all three games unsurprisingly have resulted in losses for Minnesota. However, the struggles would go beyond his shooting effort as he also fouled out the game while also recording four turnovers.

It's not Dawson Garcia's fault the Gophers lost on Monday, not completely, it's a full team effort of course but when your top player only finishes with five points and fouls out, you're going to struggle to win any game in the Big Ten, regardless of your opponent.

The star of Monday night's game for the Gophers was easily freshman guard Isaac Asuma who played 40 minutes and totaled 18 points, four rebounds, and three assists. It was a really impressive effort from the Minnesota native who was confident throughout the night on the offensive side of the court, shooting 7-of-11 from the field including 3-of-4 from three-point range. The next challenge for Asuma this season is going to be to string these types of performances together. He doesn't have to score 18 points every night or even have a double-digit effort every night but if the true freshman can begin stringing together efficient performances on a game-to-game basis, that will go a long way for the Gophers the rest of the season.

Despite it being yet another conference loss for the Gophers. It was a promising performance. Ohio State is a really good team despite their five losses this season. The Buckeyes heading into Monday had only been losing to KenPom top-25 teams, and the Gophers took the Buckeyes to the wire on Monday night. Not only that but it's a game that if the Gophers had capitalized on their free throws, would've easily won. That's what makes the loss so frustrating. It was a chance to potentially get a huge momentum-building win in a season that's been a struggle, the opportunity was there for the taking, and they couldn't get it done.

If the Gophers can play the way they did against the Buckeyes on Monday and convert their free throws going forward, they'll have the opportunity to right the ship as the Big Ten schedule progresses.

The problem for the Gophers is that it doesn't get any easier going forward. According to KenPom, the Gophers will face five top-30 teams in their next six games with the lone team not inside the top 30 being the Iowa Hawkeyes. In fact, going forward, only four opponents for the remainder of the season for the Gophers are not ranked within the top 50 currently on KenPom. Currently, the Gophers are projected to win just one conference game this season.

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