COLUMBUS, Ohio — For 8-year-old Thad and the rest of the Matta family, it was a Sunday ritual, as it was for any other group of Hoosier basketball fans of that era. Get home from church, sit down and watch Bob Knight's Sunday afternoon coach's show.

In 1976, there wasn't better programming a basketball fan could find, and growing up near the Indiana border in Hoopeston, Ill., Thad Matta came of age with the team his Ohio State Buckeyes are now trying to replicate.

Asked Friday about his first memories as a basketball fan, the coach of 24-0 Ohio State talked about the 32-0 Indiana Hoosiers of 1975-76. They included a freshman named Scott Eells, a Hoopeston native who amplified the attention on Knight's team in Matta's hometown. But with an appreciation passed down from his father, Jim, a high school coach and administrator, young Thad would have loved them anyway.

"He was like my idol," Matta said of Eells. "So, I just, at that point, started saying that was the team right there. You had [Quinn] Buckner, [Scott] May, [Kent] Benson, [Tom] Abernethy. That was a great team, obviously."

With seven games remaining in the regular season, three in the Big Ten Tournament and six in the NCAA Tournament, the Buckeyes would have to reach 40 wins to remain undefeated -- so they're 60 percent of the way there.

Already they're only the fourth team in the past eight years to reach February without a loss. St. Joseph's got to 27-0 in 2004, Illinois reached 29-0 before losing to the Buckeyes in 2005 and Memphis was stopped at 26-0 in 2008. For weeks, Matta and his players have been deflecting undefeated talk, often by talking about how difficult their next game is -- six of their 11 Big Ten wins have been by five points or fewer. Saturday at Wisconsin, with Matta at 0-5 at the Kohl Center as coach of the Buckeyes, is the next potential end to the streak.

"We play Wisconsin on Saturday, Michigan State on Tuesday and Purdue on Sunday. All I've got to do is think about playing those games and it brings me right back to reality," Matta said.

One thing hasn't changed -- Matta doesn't buy the idea a loss would be good for his team.

"I know how hard it is to win in college basketball," Matta said. "I'm one of those guys, I like winning better than I do losing."

One thing has changed -- for the first time against Minnesota on Sunday, Matta sensed an opponent wasn't just playing Ohio State.

It was playing the undefeated No. 1 team in the country.

"I think we're getting everybody's best effort," Matta said, "which is a great thing. That's the way it should be."

To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: dlesmerises@plaind.com, 216-999-4479