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After Ohio State assistant John Groce was hired as Ohio University's men's basketball coach, one of his first challenges was obvious: Find a way to return Jerome Tillman to the All-Mid-American Conference first team.

Tillman is the 6-foot-6 Beavercreek High School product who has massive jumping ability and a better-than-average outside shot. As a sophomore, he was seventh in the conference in scoring (14.6 points per game) and fourth in rebounding (8.2 boards per game). That season, he was voted to the MAC's first team.

Then, after being voted to the preseason All-MAC team, Tillman averaged 13.3 points and 7.6 boards and dropped to honorable mention status.

It's clear that Tillman can be one of the MAC's stars and is one of Groce's better players as he steps into his first head coaching job. Now the challenge is for Groce to find the best way to use Tillman in his offense to get the most out of him.

Tillman has enough athletic ability that he made "SportsCenter's" Top 10 plays twice last season, once for a dunk and once for a block. He also was one of the players present at Groce's introductory press conference.

"I've been talking about being a family for the last two years," Tillman told reporters. "We really need to build a good relationship with Coach Groce, and by doing that we'll be OK."

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-7389

or

knagel@DaytonDailyNews.com

.