Ohio State men's hoops finalizing home-and-home series with Vanderbilt

The Ohio State men’s basketball team will bring at least one high-major opponent to the Jerome Schottenstein Center this season.

The Buckeyes are finalizing an agreement to begin a home-and-home series with Vanderbilt that will see the Commodores come to Columbus in 2026-27 before hosting Ohio State in 2027-28. The game is the latest in a string of high-major opponents for the Buckeyes, but the first to be played on their home court.

Ohio State will open the season by playing BYU in Salt Lake City and will also face Kansas in Madison Square Garden as part of the CBS Sports Classic. The Buckeyes will finish a home-and-home series with Notre Dame with a road game and begin a home-and-home series with a road game against UConn.

The game will be a return for Vanderbilt assistant coach Joel Justus, who was Ohio State coach Jake Diebler’s associate coach the past two seasons. Diebler also spent three seasons as an assistant coach at Vanderbilt from 2016-19.

Ohio State men’s basketball beat writer Adam Jardy can be reached at ajardy@dispatch.com, on Bluesky at @cdadamjardy.bsky.social or on Twitter at @AdamJardy.

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Ohio State to begin Vanderbilt series with 2026-27 home game